


Stationstuck

by osteogenitor



Series: Stationstuck [1]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - Space, Author is Not An Astronaut, Blood and Injury, Copious Snark, Dissociation, Drug Use, Eventual Romance, Everyone is Like 35, Hostage Situations, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Intersecting Storylines, Mental Health Issues, Near Future, Other, Panic Attacks, Prescription Drug Abuse, Questionable Reactions to Trauma, Realistic Gore, Smoking, Space Stations, Strilonde Family Matters, Stupid References, Terrorism, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, no beta we die by the hand of spellcheck, pretty much everyone has at least one line, semi-realistic depictions of astrophysics, tags will update frequently, uncomfortable proximity to corpses, vlogging - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-13 01:47:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 23,782
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29020692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/osteogenitor/pseuds/osteogenitor
Summary: In which our protagonist begins his first mission on a new space station, accompanied by a motley crew of multinational astronauts who engage in frequent banter even when things go catastrophically wrong; and in which our protagonist's brother is the head of communications at the space agency and struggles to maintain a work-life balance and also to solve extremely difficult problems without telling anyone; and in which our protagonist's other brother is a rapper in an indie band based in the Southern United States that becomes embroiled in a global crisis by pure circumstance; and in which our antagonist's henchman mentally wrestles with certain illegal actions he is expected to execute at the behest of our antagonist.Heed the tags. If they're not relevant right now, they will be. Particular triggers will be noted at the start of each chapter.
Relationships: Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas, Nepeta Leijon & Dave Strider, Rose Lalonde/Kanaya Maryam, Sollux Captor & Dave Strider, Sollux Captor/Aradia Megido
Series: Stationstuck [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2129643
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	1. Chapter I: Square Seconds

**Author's Note:**

> this fic begins with a really long authors note that i know nobody is going to read unless theyre the kind of person who eagerly looks forward to books that have a shiny gold “WITH A NEW PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR” sticker on the front. so for convenience i put it in the end notes. youre welcome.
> 
> i dedicate this fic to my high school senior english teacher who wrote a masters thesis on homestuck. if youre reading this, ms. REDACTED, i credit you with everything i ever learned about writing or whatever.

Dave Strider is the stupidest motherfucker to ever scrape his way through a master's degree.

At least, that's what he thinks while he waits the final twenty seconds leading up to launch.

"Nervous?" Rose Lalonde asks, smirking. Somewhere outside a man with a charismatic voice chants _eighteen, seventeen, sixteen…_

"Hell nah," Dave replies, even though he can barely hear himself over the pounding of his heart in his ears. "I was born for this shit." _Thirteen, twelve, eleven…_ and his heart is also pounding in his throat and eyes and gums. Pretty much everywhere, actually. Fuck, can your heart explode in space?

"Ready to go," Rose says calmly into her headset when the countdown hits ten. She leans back and turns back to Dave, lowering her voice. "This ride only stops in an emergency. Crying is not an emergency."

"Fuck you." Dave grimaces. _Seven, six, five…_

Okay. So this is it. Dave suddenly forgets how he got here. The seven years between walking into his first materials chemistry lecture and climbing into this tiny neon-orange capsule seem to have compressed into an attosecond. Attoseconds. The best time unit. Atta' second, go get 'em girl.

Dave's thoughts are interrupted by the intensifying roar of the engines below him. _Two, one, liftoff!_ the man yells, and crackling remnants of applause erupting in the background barely make it through the speaker system before everything is drowned out in an ungodly rush of noise that sounds like Niagara Falls pouring directly into one's eardrum. Dave's head is thrown back by the increasing pressure, but he barely feels it through the layers of padding that form a geological stratum between his skull and the headrest. He runs through them quickly. His skin, obviously. Hair probably counts for something too. Nylon cap. Expanded polystyrene foam and polyurethane. Polycarbonate. Polyurethane again.

"Approaching 14 meters per second squared," Rose speaks into her headset, almost humming, immaculately calm and poised. She doesn't even need to pilot, really. A team of twenty guys on computers six months ago are piloting. But she gets to have the title anyway and it imbues her with exactly as much smugness as Dave has learned to expect. He's technically the copilot here, but it's second place in a two-person race, and he's finding it hard to feel smug as the capsule pushes into the g-force range of a small rollercoaster. How the fuck do you get a squared second anyway?

"20 meters per second squared," Rose announces. Her demeanor doesn't crack even under the increasing pressure that makes Dave feel like his teeth are going to shatter and his eyeballs flatten into pancakes. He was never one to shy away from this kind of g-force on the ground, fuck no, he's conquered the tallest and fastest coasters from Anaheim to Orlando like it was nothing but somehow it's way worse going up _holy shit it is so much worse going up._

"25, 26 meters per second squared," she diligently reports to the ground team who are probably unimpressed. They've planned this shit out for months, probably even years, and they've run thousands of simulations that push Rose and Dave's digital bodies to the edge of human survivability and sometimes beyond. 26 meters a second squared? Nah, call me back when your wireframe corpse has disintegrated into particles above the Pacific. Dave tries very hard not to think about disintegrating into particles above the Pacific. Instead, he thinks about how fucking cool he must look from the ground in this billion-dollar TicTac spiraling up into space on the world's greatest firework trail. Incredibly cool. Astronomically cool.

"30 meters per second squared," Rose says, and Dave starts to tune her out. Maybe consciously, maybe because the g-force is making his brain feel like wet cement. He can't actually hear or feel it, but he dimly remembers that the booster rockets detach at this point and the craft is hurtling towards the limits of the atmosphere as a shimmering needle. Most of the people on the ground have probably stopped watching by now because things stopped exploding and being awesome in their immediate field of view.

"34 meters per second squared," Rose says. "This is about as bad as it gets." She smiles at Dave. Dave tries to smile back but probably ends up looking like a horse being threatened with a machine gun. How did he get here again? It involved a lot of college, right? Some shit about chemicals? Holy fuck he is going to die up here and be remembered as the lamest astronaut in history. This is cause to break out the big guns. _Dear God,_ Dave shuts his eyes and pleads silently. _If this is it, I'm letting you know that I've decided to become a real deal believer. I heard that converting at the last second totally works. Please forgive me for all my sins. I'll even stop being gay if you let me into heaven._

"G-forces decreasing as we exit the atmosphere," Rose chirps, less for Mission Control's sake and more for Dave's. It damn well works. Dave feels his body relax and internally castigates himself for probably making everything worse by tensing up so hard. It's just like that thing that happens at the dentist where you have to remind yourself every two minutes that you're not actually afraid of dentists and manually unclench your fists. At least this time he doesn't end up looking like a pussy in front of the dentist. And, oh yeah, he's in _motherfucking space._ A wave of childlike giddiness hits him like a tidal wave as he realizes he actually did it. Real astronaut hours up here. Even though the capsule doesn't have a window, he can sense the vastness, the holiness, the raw immensity of the void around him. God damn. _Sorry God,_ he muses. _I think I'm dropping out of Christianity after all, because I don't know what you could do to top this._

Rose flashes Dave a genuine smile, an uncommon expression of real pride for him that doesn't reflect back onto herself like it usually does. "How do you like it, space cadet?" She says.

"Seven outta ten," Dave responds, but he struggles immensely to keep up the cool facade in the light of being _in space. In space!_ "Too much vacuum." He can't suppress his grin at the end.

"I'm so sorry to hear that," Rose replies sardonically but still with a smile on her face. "I'll be sure to let CAPCOM know, and we'll do everything in our power to make your next visit better."

"CAPCOM?" Dave returns, unable to keep his own smile under control either. "Are they gonna make a brand new Megaman just for me?"

"I'm making you what?" A voice comes in from the intercom.

"Megaman," Rose answers. "Over."

"You don't have to use the radio talk, Rose," says the voice, and Dave's brain finally perks up in recognition.

"Hey, Dirk!" He says loudly, pulling down his own headset for the first time.

"Hey, Dave," Dirk replies.

"Guess where I am?" Dave looks at Rose and pretends to twirl a phone cord next to his ear. Rose returns a sensible snicker.

"Gee, Dave, I don't know. Fayette County Jail again?" Dirk's static-tinted voice says. "No, don't tell me you ran off with that girl from Oklahoma! She's no good for you, Dave, and she isn't even a real cowgirl."

"I can't believe they let you guys do this," Rose quips in her own headset.

"They can't fire me because I'm too awesome," Dirk answers flatly, dropping his theatrical tone, but Dave can still detect the hint of a smile in there. Coming from Dirk, that's a lot. "Plus, the press loves it. The whole 'family affair' deal, like we're all the kids from _The Royal Tenenbaums,_ except they also didn't watch that movie all the way through."

"Serious talk," Rose says. "Can you get Flight to give me an ETA here? I'm looking at… five hours thirty-five, is that right?"

"Sure," Dirk responds quickly. He's only gone for a moment before his voice crackles back. "Flight says five hours thirty-three. Lucky you. Wait, sorry, five hours thirty-two and forty seconds. They wanted me to clarify that."

"Thank God," Dave says. "That extra twenty seconds might have been more than I could take."

"You never know. Listen, y'all behave up there, Roxy wants me to give a statement real quick. I'll be back way before you need to actually prep for docking." Dave hears Dirk hang up on his end and the inside of the capsule is suddenly way too silent.

"Rose, say something or I'm gonna go insane," Dave pleads after just a couple seconds of silence.

"Really?" She responds. "I was going to meditate quietly for the next five hours."

"Sure, you do that," Dave retorts. "I can entertain myself. For example, _this is the song that never ends…_ "

"Nope," Rose interjects immediately.

" _It goes on and on my friends,_ " Dave continues. " _Some people started singing it not knowing what it was…_ "

"No," Rose sounds exasperated. "I'll kill you. I'll murder you in space and no court on Earth would convict me for it."

" _And now they keep on singing it just because this is the song that never ends…_ " Rose claps her hand over Dave's mouth for a second before they both break into laughter.

"Okay," Dave says, a little out of breath from laughing. "Okay! But for real though, talk to me. I might actually get all Space Odyssey up here."

"Are you taking Hal's role?" Rose says, still smiling broadly and emotionally unguarded in a way that makes Dave think she doesn't know she's doing it. Or maybe being in outer space just makes people act different.

"Nah, I'm still Dave, I'd just end up going through the shit with the baby and the old guy and the Victorian mansion in my own head," Dave can't help smiling back. Maybe there's not enough oxygen in here. Let's just take off our helmets and freeze to death like that kid from Magic School Bus. Kind of mixing metaphors here, huh? "How about you explain how the fuck you square a second for me again?"

"Of course," Rose says. She leans her chair back as far as it goes and slides her hands behind her head, still smiling at the ceiling.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi. this is the authors note.
> 
> the first thing i want to say is that i do not like homestuck. i think homestuck is a fucking objectively bad story written by a racist weirdo. unfortunately, despite my best efforts, the extenuating circumstances of being in a global pandemic and shit have forced me back into the darkest dredges of coping, and that is where this homestuck au i came up with when i was 13 lurks. it never left my head and finally writing it down is my way of ripping off the bandaid and hopefully moving on with my life.
> 
> for the sake of writing this story, i do not give a shit about what is or isnt canon in the homestuck cinematic universe. i never read the epilogues or the dating sims or whatever. my knowledge of homestuck officially ends with the credit roll at the end of the comic. i dont care if people are out of character because, as far as im concerned, these arent even homestuck characters anymore. i stole them and they live with me now. skimming the wiki to make sure i got certain things right did not give me any enjoyment. i feel only disgust and the latent trauma associated with being twelve years old, even if you never actually went to middle school. so if you have issues with characterization take it up with andrew hussie in 2016. while youre there throw my computer in the ocean.
> 
> despite all that crap im still going to actually try and make this story good, as a sort of apology to my younger self and as a way to empty out all the baggage i never cleaned out of my head and maybe become a better person for it or whatever. in the cool twitter words, homestuck has been living in my head rent free for five years and this is me evicting it. you, the lucky reader, get to watch. thanks slash sorry.
> 
> one more note. because this story is set on a space station operated by space agencies that actually exist in the real world, i tried my best to at least sort of conform to the regulations of real world space agencies. unfortunately, a lot of homestuck characters have (or at least i think they have) neurodivergencies/mental illnesses/disabilities that would disqualify them from being astronauts under current guidelines. as a result, i want you, the reader, to make the assumption that some kind of future medicine shenanigans mean that these characters symptoms have been managed to the point where they can operate in space without being a danger to themselves or others. i say this because i think sollux having epilepsy and jade having narcolepsy, to name a few, is very important to their characterization and i dont want to erase that, but it is a necessity of the setting. most of the major disabilities that are caused by other stuff during the actual course of homestucks plot are mirrored here at some point. the deaths and injuries that happen in this story arent exactly the same as in canon nor do they happen in the same order or for similar reasons, but various characters will definitely be dismembered in familiar ways.
> 
> if you actually read all of that, thanks. nerd.


	2. Chapter II: Energetic Particles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dave makes at least one friend, crewmembers discuss the nuances of Japanese honorifics, and some people watch a boring movie.

Docking is uneventful. Dave is kind of out of it after five and a half hours in a capsule the size of a walk-in closet, and he watches blearily as Rose chatters into her headset and actually does some piloting for once. They latch onto the existing module of the space station without any problems, and Dave only wakes up enough to notice the door opening.

This is Derse, one half of the world's most ambitious long-term space station project ever. Together with Prospit, which launches tomorrow and docks with Derse soon after, they form SKAIA, a station which is extravagantly large (by space standards) and well-equipped (by any standards.) A multinational scientific collaboration, costing an unimaginable amount of money and manpower to create, and promising to advance humanity into the new space age. Dave wonders when his brain started functioning like an advertising brochure.

Dave and Rose unbuckle themselves simultaneously and move to unlatching the looming bags of cargo that fill the rest of the capsule. Dave wakes up a little more when he notices who's come to greet them.

Commander Megido and Chief Flight Engineer Captor are both wearing Japanese JAXA uniforms, light grey coveralls with white T-shirts underneath, and emblazoned with patches of the Japanese flag, the JAXA logo, and the mission patches for the Derse module and the SKAIA project as a whole. The Derse patch is shield-shaped with a purple background and pink and white threaded borders, a simple pinkish crescent moon symbol resting in the center and the year in dark Roman numerals above it. The SKAIA patch is round and pale blue with an elaborate green spirograph overlaid on a white silhouette of the station. _Thank God for machine stitching,_ Dave thinks, looking at the complicated green spirograph, then realizes he knows nothing about embroidery or stitching at all.

"Commander Aradia Megido," she introduces herself with a beaming smile and warm handshake.

"Captor," he introduces himself with a terse glare and mouth pressed into a razor-thin line.

Megido has woolly black hair pulled up into a bun that does nothing to hide its enormity. JAXA must have vastly different rules about hair than NASA does. They made Dave shave his fucking sideburns. Megido's charming round face keeps Dave's thoughts from wandering too far into the tangles of bureaucratic aesthetics, though. Her eyes are dark brown and rimmed in darker lashes that could captivate someone like the world's most adorable basilisk. She has warm tan skin dotted with freckles and moles, sturdy hands, and a feminine figure that Dave is not heterosexual enough to wax poetic about. Maybe Rose would have something Sapphic to say about her.

Captor is so vastly different to Megido it's a wonder they came from the same planet, let alone country. While Megido has skin that basically defines "a healthy glow," Captor glows like he's been caught in the flash of a disposable Kodak camera. His skin is taught and marked with acne scars, which Dave doesn't judge, but damn if they don't contribute to the look. His hair sticks out at weird angles and seems to have the exact same texture as the needles of a plastic Christmas tree. He's skinny and bony and looks too tall to have even fit in the capsule to get here. Dave also notices, under the tired, glossy eyelids, Captor has one blue eye and one brown. Well, that's something.

Dave is almost too tired to appreciate the sensation of weightlessly floating through the corridor that leads to the main body of the station. Almost. He revels in the feeling that lasts so much longer and feels so much better than anything he's experienced in a simulator or a parabolic plane. He tries a somersault and finds his feet hitting the ceiling. This is also when he remembers he can take his helmet off.

Megido leads them to the main room with a couple floaty turns around corners. She talks excitedly with Rose, probably recognizing that Dave is way too tired and brain-fried to carry a conversation right now. Captor trails behind Dave, spindly knuckles hooked around the rails that line every wall, eyes fixed on Dave with a scrutinizing look. Captor's gangly limbs take up most of the hallway, blocking any retreat... is he… making sure Dave doesn't run away? Okay. Whatever. Not like he was planning to.

When the quartet finally drifts into the main room, Dave is presented with four other astronauts waiting patiently for their introductions.

"Equius Zahhak," one man introduces himself. "Flight engineer. Pleased to meet you." He looks like he's been hitting the station's exercise machines far more than his mandatory quota. He also looks like he breaks his nose at least once a year. His hair is straight and black, just a little too short to pull into a reasonable ponytail, and his furry eyebrows are contrasted by a meticulously shaved chin and lip that look, Dave thinks, visibly irritated. Obviously a military man.

"Eridan Ampora," says the man next to him. This guy is a lot scrawnier, but still nowhere near Captor levels. He has wavy hair that comes to a point above his head and barely moves as he floats. Dave pretends to be staring at his eyebrows, which are naturally shaped like an Instagram model's, instead of the kid-in-a-bubble-bath hairdo. Ampora's nose is thin in a way that seems mismatched with the rest of his face, which is all broad cheekbones and clefted chins and pursed lips. Handsome, but not really anyone's type, per se. Definitely not Dave's. It takes real physical effort for Dave not to slap himself for even considering one of his crewmates as a romantic interest. It's probably against the rules or something, too. "Science officer," Ampora pipes up just before Dave moves on to examining the next in line. Did he forget what his job was? Jesus Christ.

"Nepeta Leijon," the woman chirps, holding her hands up to pose in front of her face while she gives a charming, camera-ready smile. "Flight engineer." Her eyes are enormous, deep green and surrounded by fluffy eyelashes, the kind Dave knows look great but constantly fall into your eyeball. Anyway. She has a faint scar right above her lip. Dave thinks that means she had a cleft lip as a kid, and he also thinks that's the sort of thing he's not supposed to notice. Her hair is curly and pinned back with three brightly-colored barettes, and the bridge of her rounded nose is scattered with freckles. She looks more like a high schooler than a space station engineer who has to be actually at least thirty. That makes her another miss for romantic contenders. You know, like it matters.

"Feferi Peixes," the final member of the lineup announces. "Science officer." Dave knows she's Australian before he sees the flag embroidered on her jumpsuit. Her accent isn't cartoonish, and it might be disguised by her excessively cheery tone, but it couldn't be mistaken for anything else. Peixes' hair is pushed back with a headband and tied into some kind of elaborate braided bun below. The parts of it that escape confinement are wiry curls that leap out in any direction. She has a broad nose and a facial structure that seems to have been worn smooth by ocean tides, gentle dark skin, darker moles under her jawbone. Dave gets to see so many different angles because she never stops jumping around. She dives forward to shake his hand, and Dave obliges, but he's too zoned out to interact with other humans beyond categorizing their physical appearance and broad strokes of personality, _strong guy awkward guy cute girl friendly girl._ And all of them are wearing basically the same outfit. Cool.

Captor also notices the way Dave's brain is seemingly floating away out of his body and makes a curt suggestion that he get some rest. Commander Megido agrees and leads Dave to the small bedroom he's supposed to share with two other people. Both of them are arriving tomorrow, John and what's-his-face the Russian, and Dave can appreciate that this is probably the only time he's ever going to get this room to himself. He straps into the vertical sleeping bag with STRIDER printed on the front, and he's asleep almost immediately.

When Dave is shaken awake later, he reels with panic and disorientation for several moments. Where the fuck is he? Floating, space station, right. Astronaut. Materials chemistry, remember? After he finishes his mental checklist, he actually notices who woke him up. It's Leijon in her olive green uniform, a color that does not go well with the Swedish flag on her shoulder.

"Hi, Strider," she says cheerfully. "Dinner time. You can go back to bed afterwards, but you gotta eat, okay?" The way she speaks is kind of funny, more than just a Scandinavian accent or a repaired cleft lip. It sounds like she's intentionally turning her "er"s into "ur"s.

"Sure," Dave replies, pulling the velcro straps of the sleeping bag away and pushing after Leijon through the hallway. "What are we having?" He calls to her, she's obviously much more used to weightlessness and has to slow down and wait for Dave in the doorway.

"Well, you're a lot bigger than I am," she giggles, and yeah, she's totally making that "ur" sound on purpose. On _purr_ pose, even. "And a lot less Swedish! So you're getting steak and I'm getting fish."

"Sounds dope," Dave says, finally pushing into the main room, where Captor and Megido are each funneling hot water into some kind of bag that probably contains soup. Zahhak and Ampora are leaning against the opposite wall, eating some European seafood dish, probably the same thing Leijon's having. Rose and Feferi are absent.

Dave rifles around in the box of NASA food, eventually pulling out a large plastic bag containing his dinner meal, all of which is vacuum-sealed in microwaveable packaging. He tosses the whole thing into the station microwave that probably cost twenty million dollars to build, waits exactly sixty seconds, and pulls it back out.

"How are you enjoying space, Strider?" Leijon asks when Dave grabs on to a handlebar to "sit" next to them. She pokes her fish thing (sardines? anchovies? with hot sauce?) and smiles.

"It's cool," Dave says around a mouthful of potato roll, trying not to spew crumbs in the air, less for manners and more for the safety of the ventilation system. "How many times have you been up here? You look like you just got out of space camp."

Leijon laughs. "This is my third time in weightlessness. Well, besides training on the plane." Dave nods in acknowledgement as he scarfs down the rectangular steak. "You should ask Sollux about it, he's been up here a million times."

Captor scowls from the other side of the room, slurping his bag of soup.

"Is that why he's so tall? Man's joints are separating or something," Dave responds to both Captor's glare and Leijon's comment.

"I dunno! Is it, Sollux?" Leijon chirps, leaning forwards with her hands on her knees, letting her tin of fish float beside her.

Captor flips her off. "If you won't say _-san_ , you can at least not use my first name," he grumbles, dangling the soup bag by the nozzle between two spidery fingers.

"I let you call me Nepeta," she protests.

"You were in high school when I was in postgrad," Captor retorts. "And you're a total weeb who wants me to call you _-chan_ anyway."

"How old are you, Leijon?" Dave asks absently, not quite willing to put down this bag of mashed potatoes and devote his full attention to the banter.

"Thirty-one," she answers. "You can call me Nepeta, too, if you want." She smiles again and grabs her fish from the air.

"But can I borrow your hot sauce?" Dave smiles back. Nepeta wordlessly tosses the bottle of sauce towards him. It's some unknown Swedish brand, but it's red and spicy and fucking delicious on this compressed meat bar.

"Prospit docks tomorrow," Aradia announces as she packs her empty soup container into the trash. "Take it easy tonight, crew!"

"Wanna watch a movie with me and Equius?" Nepeta asks Dave curiously. "There's a digital projector in the exercise room, if you fold up all the workout stuff! We have all kinds of movies."

"Oh, hell yeah," Dave answers, packing up his own trash. "Can Rose come? If I can't do my telepathic twin communication shit with her I'll have no choice but to talk through the whole thing."

"Sure! Aradia, can I use the intercom? I don't know where Rose is," Nepeta purrs. Okay, one, she has some balls to call the _Commander_ , the _Japanese Commander who is at least a decade her senior_ by first name, and two, she's definitely playing up the cat thing. Catgirls in space. Incredible.

Megido gives a thumbs up and a matching radiant smile, prompting Nepeta to float over to a speaker switch. "Attention, crew!" She chimes, her voice echoing through the station. "Rose Lalonde is wanted in Gym for movie night, stat! Cheers!" She takes her paw (her hand. it's her hand.) off the switch and bounces past Dave, beckoning him to follow. Zahhak follows silently, almost ominously. The trio floats into a room far away from the one Dave stayed in, Dave still relying on other people to lead him around the station. He also realizes someone else must have towed his space suit and gear into storage. Did he really just leave his helmet floating in the hallway? Fucking hell. Even in weightlessness he can't pull his own.

Nepeta and Zahhak begin folding exercise equipment into the wall while Dave absently drifts towards a box of USB drives tagged with movie names. He flips through them like an old-fashioned card catalog. It seems like each drive has three or four movies on it, except for some that are particularly long. There are also a frightening number of tacky rom-coms in the mix.

"Who brought My Best Friend's Girl?" Dave asks sarcastically. "Thought they kept these all locked up in the Library of Congress."

"Those are Karkat's," Nepeta giggles. This lady giggles a lot for an astronaut. "He ships them in advance. They're his American cultural treasures."

Vantas, that's Karkat Vantas, coming tomorrow with the rest of the crew. Russian. The guy who's going to share a bedroom with him. Dave literally can't help but imagine him as a grimacing soldier in an ushanka with an AK-47 strapped across his back and a stack of rom-com DVDs under his arm. Maybe even a dolly cart full of them. Damn, he's gonna be disappointed if the dude doesn't actually look like that. Obviously they don't let you bring guns in space, but the ushanka is fair game.

Dave is startled from his fantasizing (fantasizing? no, nope, wrong word) by a projector lightbulb beaming directly into his eyeballs. "Sorry!" Nepeta squeaks. Dave clumsily ducks under the beam and pushes off the wall towards where Nepeta and Zahhak are floating.

"Hello," Rose announces as she cautiously floats into the room. "I was summoned for 'movie night'?"

"Damn straight," Dave says, patting the empty air next to him.

"Well, how exciting," Rose muses in her favorite almost-singsong voice. "What, do tell, will be showing this evening?"

Nepeta says something in Swedish, fuck if Dave knows what. "Wonderful," Rose replies. "One of my favorites." Of course she's heard of it, what a hipster.

"It has subtitles," Zahhak clarifies in Dave's direction. Oh yeah, this guy is here too. Nepeta slots her neon green USB drive into the projector and clicks around until it starts playing. Dave tries to pay attention to it, some kidnapping story in a very blue and grey European city, occasionally shooting Rose looks that they both understand as meaning _look-at-this-sketchy-ass-motherfucker_ or _her-hair-is-falling-out-in-this-scene_ , but both of them keep their mouths shut because they can tell Nepeta and Zahhak are genuinely entranced by it.

When the movie finally ends, Nepeta lets out an excited whoop while Zahhak and Rose clap politely. Dave joins them in the applause, trying to give Rose another meaningful glance, but she's looking past him at Nepeta. Eventually, the clapping dies out and the party floats out into the hallway.

"Y'all have Skittles or anything up here?" Dave queries, rubbing his eyes to adjust from the dimmed rec room to the stark hallway lights. "For next time, y'know," He adds to clarify.

"Oh, yeah!" Nepeta answers enthusiastically. "I'm glad you enjoyed it! We usually do this a couple nights a week, sometimes more people hop in if they aren't busy…" She kind of trails off at the end, clearly tired.

"Okay, bed time," Dave says. "See you in the morning, folks." He floats around to where he thinks he remembers the bathroom being and nearly crashes head-on into Captor.

"Fuck!" Dave exclaims, clumsily trying to reorient himself in the narrow hallway. "Sorry, man."

Captor shrugs. "Glad you're having fun," he says enigmatically, effortlessly floating past Dave. Dave stalls for a second, waiting to see if Captor has any other comments. Weird guy. He eventually continues towards the bathroom, where he brushes his teeth with a fizzing toothpaste tablet and government-issued toothbrush. He stares into his own tired eyes in the small mirror bolted to the wall. _You fucking did it, bro,_ he says to himself. _you made it happen._

Dave crawls back to his new bedroom, where Rose is already lashed into her sleeping bag with a pair of white headphones over her ears. Dave gets into his own bag, letting his body relax, imagining the way the station silently circles the Earth below, the gentle rotation of its solar wings, observatory windows twinkling with reflected stars…


	3. Chapter III: Walking Orbit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dave and Sollux make some soup and the author writes more gratuitous descriptions of people.

Commander Megido nervously watches the blackness through the oblong window. Dave tries not to pay too much attention to her. There's nothing he can do to help with docking Prospit, and he can tell trying to talk to Megido will only make her more nervous. He's actually supposed to be in lab right now, but nobody seems to care if he just fucks around the station instead. Besides, not like he can get much done until Jade arrives, anyway.

Jade Harley and John Egbert. The only two people on this mission, besides Rose, that Dave has actually met in person beyond shaking hands at a conference. The rest of the Prospit crew are strangers, mostly Russian. Dave only just now realizes how relieved he'll be once John and Jade are here. Everyone else on Derse seems to know each other already, either as friends or acquaintances, but Dave is just an underqualified interloper. Some of the anxiety radiating off Megido sticks to the back of his neck like static electricity.

Most people in the space business know about Megido because _everyone_ knows about the _other_ Megido, her sister. Dave doesn't remember her first name and like hell he's going to ask this Megido, the only Megido that's still standing. Ten years ago, when Dave and Rose and probably a lot of the other people on this station were still undergraduates who mostly didn't give a damn about space, the prototype of this mission launched. A smaller space station, still designed to be assembled in two pieces but holding a crew of six instead of sixteen. And the older Megido was one of the first people sent up to work on assembly. She went solo, did her work admirably. And then her return capsule failed on re-entry, cracking into shreds and scattering debris over the Gulf of Mexico. Body never recovered, not that there was likely to be much to find anyway.

Dave suddenly understands what Megido is really staring at through the window. The prototype space station is still out there, unfinished and empty, and of course it runs a similar orbit to SKAIA. He can't see it from where he's leaning against the wall, but he knows it's somewhere nearby, trailing behind them and probably shedding parts along the way. Nobody ever went back aboard after the first Megido died. It's nothing more than a cenotaph.

"Strider," Megido says without turning away from the window. "Can you go check on Sol-- can you check on Officer Captor for me?" She leans forwards to press her forehead on the window.

"Sure thing," Dave answers, pushing off the wall and heading down the hallway maybe a little to abruptly to seem natural. Captor is always in the main room, either chatting with EECOM in Tokyo or running maintenance on the comms board. Those are apparently his only jobs for now, but Dave has heard he's having some science supplies delivered through Prospit.

"Captor," Dave calls when he enters the room. "Sup?"

Captor looks up but doesn't say anything. He's curled up like a pill bug, floating just above the floor and picking at some switch on the comms board. Someone says something into his headset, Dave can only barely hear it, and Captor responds in Japanese before disconnecting and pulling the apparatus off his head. He haphazardly tosses it towards the magnetic storage panel.

"Megido asked me to check on you," Dave says, moving towards the man a little, still kind of worried he might uncoil rapidly and strike him with a poisonous bite to the face. It doesn't happen. "You hungry? Show me how to make soup on this thing."

Captor scowls, then sighs and kicks off the wall in Dave's direction. He rummages around in a food storage box, pulling out a JAXA-labeled soup bag and tossing it to Dave. It's shaped kind of like a Capri Sun pouch, but with a twistable nozzle instead of a straw. "Come over here," Captor beckons unenthusiastically. "Press this switch, and turn the dial to whatever between like 67 and 72. It takes a second to heat up. When the red light comes on take the faucet thing and hook your bag up to it." He looks thoughtfully at the hot water control panel. "Actually, I forgot something, you have to set the volume to 350 ml before you turn the dial. You got that?" He turns to look at Dave with an extremely bored expression and somewhat listless eyes.

Dave nods. "Got it. Switch, volume, dial, faucet, serve it forth," he answers. Captor moves out of the way and Dave starts calibrating the machine. It whirs to life as it heats up.

"Aradia's in a rough place," Captor mumbles quietly and not really in any specific direction. Dave turns around halfway, almost unsure if he actually heard anything.

"What?" Dave remarks.

"Commander Megido," Captor speaks up. "If she really asked you to come looking for me, it's because she didn't want you hanging around her." He briefly glances down at his hands and fidgets with the seam on his uniform sleeve. "Nothing personal, I'm sure. Not even you could piss her off that badly in less than twenty-four hours." He looks back at Dave and actually smiles. Dave briefly smiles back before turning back to fill up his soup bag.

Soup in hand, Dave powers down the water heater and leans against the smooth panel next to it. He slurps on the packet, something mild and seaweedy. The only English words on the packaging are "SOUP" and "USE HOT WATER." "What is this stuff called?" He asks Captor.

" _Miyeok-guk,_ " Captor answers. "It's actually Korean. You're supposed to have it after you give birth or something."

"I'll keep that in mind," Dave smirks with one lip over the bag nozzle.

"You look dumb as fuck," Captor comments. Dave snorts and takes another sip of the soup.

"You and me, let's be friends," Dave says. Captor raises his eyebrows and looks unimpressed. "Nah, I'm serious! We get along." To punctuate his point, Dave takes the noisiest possible gulp of the soup and almost chokes on it.

"You _are_ dumb as fuck," Captor says and almost maybe laughs. Dave returns a prideful smile. "When you finish that soup, I guess you can hang around while I wait for NASA to call me."

"Aw, fuck yeah!" Dave says. "My brother's in CAPCOM."

"Impressive," Captor says, slowly drifting back to cling to the comms board again. "My brother can barely talk."

"Damn, okay, you gotta tell me if this is like a disability or if he's just stupid," Dave says while sucking the last dregs of soup out of the bag. "So I know if I can make fun of him or not."

"Pff, it's a disability, I guess," Captor says dismissively. "You can make fun of him anyway."

"Nah, it doesn't feel right," Dave replies, folding the empty soup bag in half to fit it into the trash container. "He's not even here to defend himself, man."

"Yeah, he would punch your stupid ass in the face," Captor grins and Dave laughs again. "You skate or anything?"

"Used to," Dave answers. "Me and my sibs."

"Mituna's really into that, yeah," Captor says, and Dave infers that Mituna is his brother's name. "Riding around with his girlfriend looking like a douchebag. He's okay, though." Captor fiddles with some loose wire under the comms board, untangling and reattaching cables with nimble fingers. Dave notices that Captor keeps his nails long, probably a little longer than NASA would like (but maybe JAXA doesn't give a shit), because it makes it easier to pull apart the knotted wires. "How many siblings do you have?" He asks.

"Too fucking many," Dave sighs, dragging another smile out of Captor. "Me n' Rose, twins. Dirk's my oldest brother, Hal's between me and him. Roxy's technically my half-sister, I think, who gives a fuck. Pet's the youngest and also maybe my half-sib? I can't keep track of all that shit, we all grew up in the same house anyway."

"Damn," Captor replies. "My family's just me and Mituna and my father." The small talk dies out and is replaced by a newly evolved awkward silence. Dave crosses his arms, taps his fingers against his elbow, watches Captor pick at the lattice of wires. You could hear a pin drop, assuming someone threw it in the right direction. Because it's weightless. Yeah. Crowd's not having it; Dave knows it's bad when even his internal commentary jokes don't land.

The silence is gratefully broken by a crackling noise which prompts Captor to pull his headset back on. "SKAIA Derse, this is Sollux Captor," he says into the mic.

"Captor, this is CAPCOM," a familiar but muffled voice says. "Why don't you work here? Your name goes better."

"Hey, Dirk, this is David Elizabeth Strider," Dave leans in towards Captor's mic and speaks in a fake deep voice. "What's the low-down in Hous-town?"

Captor swats Dave away, barely scraping him with those long fingernails. Dave laughs loudly enough that he hopes Dirk can hear it. Captor mouths "SHUT THE FUCK UP" at him. "Alright, CAPCOM," Captor says, trying to remain professional. "Are we docking Prospit soon?"

"Yep," Dirk answers. "T-minus four minutes. Should be a piece of cake, we're controlling it from down here, I'll just let you know if we need you to press any buttons."

"Roger," Captor says, stretching slightly more upright. Dave can hear his back popping in several places. "Getting cameras on now." Captor flicks a couple switches and two of the monitors inlaid in the comms board blink to life. They show two different angles of the station's docking port. Dave can just barely see the yellow Prospit module approaching from the corner in one of them. He watches with rapt fascination as Captor presses another switch to pull up lines of data on a third screen. His eyes scan over the white lines, deciphering angles and velocities and alignments in an instant. "Looks good," he mutters into the headset mic.

"Can I talk to my brother?" Dave asks.

"What? Are you in fucking kindergarten?" Captor says, covering the mic with one hand. "No! I'm _doing something_ here." Dave pouts and Captor rolls his eyes, groaning. "CAPCOM, do you have anything to say to your brother?" He says, uncovering the mic.

"Hi Dave," Dirk answers.

"Hi," Dave responds.

"I hate you," Captor mutters to either or both of them. "Looking at T-minus two here, confirm that for me?"

"T-minus one fifty-one," Dirk says. "But who's counting?"

Dave watches as Prospit moves closer and closer on the small monitor screen. It reflects the sunlight harshly, blowing out the image a little, but obviously not enough to be a problem. Dave knows NASA wouldn't dare to launch a station with paint that hadn't been tested and approved in every scenario. Or he hopes they wouldn't.

Dave and Captor watch the screens together in silence, the only noise being the ambient hum of the station and some latent static filtering through Captor's headset. Captor pushes a button when he notices some number on the data screen change, and the docking port on the screen shifts slightly. Dave has no idea what's going on, but he also has nothing better to do than hang out here and watch. The rest of the crew is probably either involved in their science projects or waiting to greet the newcomers with Megido.

Dave can tell when the module connects even without looking at the screen because it sends a dull rattle through the bones of the entire station. The shuddering quickly subsides, and Captor flips a few more switches. "Looks good," he reports to Dirk.

"Copy. Nice work, everybody." Cheers and applause echo through the scratchy headset speakers. Captor grimaces and takes it off, holding it at arm's length. Dave makes a few congratulatory claps of his own.

"I'm supposed to wait in here for, you know, whatever," Captor says. "You can go run down there and say hi, if you want."

Dave nods and gives a douchey fake salute, then promptly turns and pushes himself down the hallway at record speeds. He grabs a handrail and uses it to swing around the corner, heading all the way across the station, eventually slowing down when he sees the rest of the newly expanded crew chatting and greeting one another. "Dave!" Jade is the first to notice him, and tries to jump up and down in excitement; she hits her head on the ceiling instead.

Dave chuckles and floats over to meet Jade in a rib-shattering hug. Girl has always been strong as fuck. It takes a few moments for them to mutually disengage from the hug, and Dave immediately takes inventory of the new arrivals.

Jade Harley, obviously. She's tall and athletic, her unflattering flight suit disguising the muscles Dave knows are there. He finds it hard to mentally describe her the way he did the rest of the crew, because duh, she's _Jade._ She doesn't look like anything besides herself. She's cut her hair for the mission, it seems, letting it fall just below her shoulderblades and spike dramatically outwards at the end. It looks like she took the biggest, strongest pair of gardening shears in her arsenal and just chopped straight across until NASA said it was short enough to fly.

John Egbert also looks the same as Dave remembers, minus glasses. Everyone on the station has to have eye surgery or those newfangled semi-permanent contact things. Without glasses to interrupt, John's dorky smile seems to push even wider until his eyes are almost completely hidden behind freckled cheeks. He quickly pulls Dave into another crushing hug, only letting go when Dave stops breathing.

"Damn, Egbert," Dave coughs when he's finally released. "Give a man some space."

"Sorry, Dave," John says. "It was just such a relief to see a familiar face!" He leans in and fake-whispers into Dave's ear, "You wouldn't believe what these Russians get up to!"

Someone scowls from behind John's shoulder and Dave immediately knows it's Vantas. Okay, he's not wearing an ushanka, but he looks so comically angry and flustered that it more than makes up for it. Dave initially places him as being pretty tall until John moves out of the way and reveals that Vantas is actually floating at least eighteen inches above the ground.

"This is Karkat," John says cheerfully, gesturing to the furious floating Russian. Vantas literally growls in indignation and sticks out a stiff arm to shake hands. Dave obliges and grabs the man's palm. He's so red-hot with anger he's practically incandescent. _This_ is the asshole who insisted on My Best Friend's Girl? Up close, he doesn't actually look very Russian at all, with walnut skin and jet-black hair that hasn't been brushed since the fall of the Berlin Wall. His facial features are round and small, almost doll-like, but worn with lines that indicate a permanently stressed psychology.

The next crewmate introduces herself enthusiastically. "Officer Vriska Serket," she remarks theatrically. She also sticks her arm out for a handshake, and Dave takes it, finding himself almost microgravity-suplexed by the force Serket employs. She grins, showing off flashing white teeth. Her hair, black and naturally wavy, is pulled into a loose braid. She manages to look somewhat fashionable, even in a bright orange jumpsuit. Dave also notices that her face and ears are dotted with almost imperceptible holes, obviously piercings that are extremely illegal in space. He makes a mental note to check her Facebook or something, because she clearly wants to be perceived as punk fucking rock and Dave needs to know whether or not to indulge her. There are few enough astronauts rocking snake bites and industrials as it is without posers in the mix.

"Terezi Pyrope," shouts another woman floating elbow-to-elbow with Serket. She smiles maniacally and slaps Dave on the back without warning, forgoing a handshake entirely. She has red-orange hair and blue eyes, pale skin, and a smattering of freckles and moles that seem to favor the left side of her face. Everything about her is incredibly sharp, from eyebrows to nose to chin to teeth, and she projects the exact demeanor of someone who grew up shooting polar bears in the Siberian wilderness. In self-defense, obviously. She doesn't look like a poacher and would have probably shot them too.

"Kanaya Maryam," the third woman introduces herself. She's standing quietly by the window with Rose (when did Rose get here??) and appears to be fiercely maintaining the distance between herself and the Serket-Pyrope-firecracker-murder-hornet-duo. Maryam has short curly hair that brushes the tops of her ears, a straight nose and high cheekbones, slender hands that nervously thrum against her hips, and bright green eyes. She stares at Dave for a minute, then turns to Rose to quietly ask a question which is answered by a microscopically subtle nod and a glance back in Dave's direction. Is this new girl trying to hijack the Strider-Lalonde telepathic highway, patent pending? Flagged for further surveillance.

"Uh, Tavros Nitram," a man pipes up nervously from the other side of the room. He's generally unremarkable and completely overshadowed by the clusterfuck standing next to him. Dave can only catalogue a few basic notes on Nitram (brown hair, brown eyes, doesn't look like he's been wearing his retainer as often as directed) before he's forced to divert his gaze to the other dude.

"Gamzee," that dude says, smiling like a dope. No last name given. By process of elimination, Dave infers that this is Makara. He has curly dark hair and a gaunt-looking face edged by stubble. Forget whatever Dave might've thought about himself earlier, _this guy_ is the least qualified to be here, hands down. Either that, or he's so absurdly overqualified that ROSCOSMOS has no choice but to let him show up for missions looking like he just toked the fuck out in a school bathroom. Or got hit by a car. Both?

So that's Prospit. Great. Everybody shares a few more congratulations and hellos and handshakes of varying intensity before dispersing around the ship. Dave is somehow left standing in the hallway with Commander Megido, feeling desperately like he should say something to her but having absolutely no idea what. He opens his mouth just enough to feel his chapped lips part before shutting it again. Megido doesn't notice, she's still staring out the window into the blackness of space, but this time her face is shallowly illuminated by the blue haze of the Earth below, deep brown eyes like the dark mirrors of Biblical legend, reflecting the edge of the atmosphere in miniscule detail. It makes Dave, who is not attracted to women (at least not this woman) but has a propensity for cinematic effect, wish he had a camera on him. It would last longer.

As it stands the moment doesn't last very long at all. Megido turns to face Dave abruptly, catching him off guard and forcing him to look away in shame. Yeah, it was kind of weird to be staring at her for that long. He swallows and clears his throat.

"Wanna come to movie night with me and Leijon tonight?" He asks dryly. It doesn't sound anywhere near as genuine as Dave meant it to be.

Megido smiles, but not enough to hide the sadness that twinkles in her doe-eyes. "I'd love to."


	4. Intermission I: True Anomaly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Hal is a rapper; in which Spades Slick is unhappy.
> 
> tws: smoking (cigarettes), edgy indie lyrics that mention murder and blood and could be inferred to be about kidnapping or relationship abuse, i guess

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> pet = davepeta  
> jas = jasprose  
> jaden = jadesprite
> 
> they are all related to dave/rose/jade respectively. "why would someone name their kid davepeta when they already had a kid named dave" you ask. i dont fucking know thats why i just call them pet. take it up with my manager ok

Hal Strider is the coolest motherfucker to ever drop out of college and start a band.

At least, that's how he feels as he corrals screeching instruments into configuration for their final song of the night. Warm New Mexico air barely ruffles his impeccable hairstyle, and this far out in the desert, not even neon concert lights can drown out all of the stars.

They're playing on an outdoor stage in some kind of anarchist collective zone, or something. Maybe just a hipster-dominated landscape, who knows, Jas booked it. The people are chill and the food is spicy and most of the amps work, so Hal thinks it could be way fucking worse than this. The crowd, maybe a hundred, hundred twenty people, tap their feet and shuffle around as they wait for the song to start. Hal finally kicks the synth to life, which shoots a reverberating screech into the night sky. He quickly quiets it down and preps it to play the prerecorded beat for this song; they do it like this so Jas can do lead guitar instead of drums. They'll mix it better for the CD, probably.

"Fort Sumner, New Mexico!" Pet cheers into their mic, reinvigorating the crowd with whoops and whistles. "We got one more song for you tonight!" They announce, stepping back towards their keyboard and setting the mic on the stand. They shoot a grin at Hal, who nods and smiles back at his half-sib (quarter-sib, maybe? if that's even possible) before turning to his own mic.

"This is _Highway Lover Song_!" Hal says. He gives the crowd a few seconds to cheer before setting the synth live. The beat begins to pulse across the desert venue and Pet joins in on keyboard shortly after.

" _I saw you  
In a dream,_"

Pet's singing is sweet, melodic, and so is this part of the beat. Their voice flows with the shimmering piano notes, the easygoing synth drums. Jas picks at their electric guitar, stringing out complementary chords, and Jaden coaxes the bass into a steady rhythm. Hal can't help but feel proud. He is so fucking good. This band is so fucking good.

" _You were gentle  
And I was mean.  
If you come back  
You know I'll change,  
All the bad things go,  
And all the good things stay._"

The crowd nods their collective heads along as the beat starts to pick up with electronic samples, lo-fi Japanese vocals spliced into a humming mechanical pattern.

" _I'll pick you flowers,  
I'll make a crown.  
Come to the meadow,  
Let's lay down._"

Pet breaks into the chorus, Jas and Jaden ramping up their instrumentals respectively.

" _Close your eyes  
One time  
One highway  
One tricky little line  
From your jawbone  
To your spine  
I love you  
And you're mine._"

Then Hal joins in for the second turn of the chorus, his raspy voice blending together with Pet's dulcet tones. Wisps of static filter into the synth. Jas does a tricky little bit of stringpicking that wasn't written into the song but sounds awesome anyway.

" _CLOSE YOUR EYES  
ONE TIME  
ONE HIGHWAY  
ONE TRICKY LITTLE LINE  
FROM YOUR JAWBONE  
TO YOUR SPINE  
I LOVE YOU  
AND YOU'RE MINE._"

Now Pet and Hal take turns, line by line.

" _Dance with me,  
FOLLOW THE TRACKS  
You know I'm always  
COMING BACK  
We'll find each other,  
THAT'S HOW IT GOES  
I'll pull you closer,  
NOBODY KNOWS._"

The backing track corkscrews into a medley of sampled notes, various strangers' voices compressed and remixed into musical arrangement. The distortion peaks, Jas and Pet back off their instruments to make more room for Jaden's bass. Jaden kills it, of course.

" _INTROSPECTIVE  
INTERSECTION_"

Hal takes control of the vocals, rapping harshly, employing a practiced tone of hoarseness on each syllable. Whoever runs the lights at this place takes the initiative to put a red spotlight on him. Perfect.

" _WHERE THE RED LINES CROSS  
DECLARE 'HERE LIES' AND THE REST IS LOST  
YOUR THOUGHTS  
START DRIPPING OUT YOUR HEAD  
LEAVE A CRIMSON TRAIL DOWN THE BACK OF YOUR BED  
STOP  
WHERE YOU LAST STOOD STILL  
AND YOU NEVER EVEN NOTICED I WAS GOING FOR THE KILL._"

Pet returns to harmonize with Hal for the final round. The beat switches to a chopped-up version of the original piano notes, no longer shimmering but echoing and twitching like the sound files of a busted-ass N64 cart. Jas jumps in with erratic guitar, Jaden's bass is insistent.

" _CLOSE YOUR EYES  
ONE TIME  
ONE HIGHWAY  
ONE TRICKY LITTLE LINE  
FROM YOUR JAWBONE  
TO YOUR SPINE  
I LOVE YOU  
AND YOU'RE MINE._"

Hal drops his mic (onto a towel, compromise with the people they're renting this setup from) and the crowd goes wild. Jas lets one screaming chord trail out into the night before Hal kills everything but his mic.

"Thank you Fort Sumner!" He yells, probably loud enough to make the mic redundant. The crowd cheers in return, someone shouts "FUCK YEAH" and "I LOVE YOU," Hal can't tell who in the dim, dusty conditions. He makes a heart symbol with his hands above his head and prompts more cheers.

Most of the crowd disperses within a few minutes, but a couple stragglers, maybe teens waiting for their ride or something, hang around to watch them pack out their instruments and carefully return the rented equipment. Jaden hops down from the wooden stage with a _humph_ , knocking the corner of her bass case on it in the process. She gives the scuff a cursory examination before dropping the thing altogether and doing yoga stretches in the dirt. Hal winds up a mic cord, casually eavesdropping on the conversation below but not really paying attention.

"Do y'all have CDs or anything?" Someone asks.

"Nah, not yet," Jaden answers. "Follow us on Spotify, though, I'on give a fuck if you wanna burn your own or whatever."

"Hey, I'm the manager," Jas climbs down the front of the stage to stand next to Jaden. "What's important is that _I_ don't give a fuck if you burn your own CD." The small gang laughs in unison.

"Y'all are cool as fuck," another member of the lingering crowd says. Hal carries his computers down the stairs at the back of the stage, loading them into the van where Pet is already waiting, backlit by the yellow LED doorlight.

"Wanna smoke?" Pet asks Hal, flicking a box of cigarettes in his direction.

"No, thanks," Hal answers. Pet shrugs and lights their own cigarette in the cup of their hands, even though there's no wind around to put it out. The two of them stare at the murky silhouettes of Jas and Jaden and the three or four fans chatting with them, the little sea of lights composing the town of Fort Sumner a couple miles into the distance, the even more distant outlines of mountains and mesas to the north. "We're not total fuckups, are we?"

"No way, bro," Pet says, puffing a cloud of smoke in Hal's opposite direction. It lingers in the still air for a while before dissipating. "I mean, think of it like this: if we were space geeks like the rest of 'em, we'd probably be the _worst space geeks._ Now we get to be the _best_ music geeks!"

"Yeah," Hal responds, contemplating a longer response, but he's interrupted by something bright and loud behind him. He turns around and hustles to the other side of the van to see a white-hot fireball arc into the sky above, leaving a snaking trail of smoke and ash in its wake. The thing blazes and roars like a goddamn dragon for a few moments, before it spirals up into the blackness and fades out, leaving just the fading contrail behind it.

"Okay," Pet says, startling Hal out of his transfixed skygazing. "So I either just witnessed a motherfucking twenty-first-century burning bush and am about to get privy to some _mad_ divine intel, or…"

"Or someone just launched a rocket," Jaden says from behind. She and Jas are standing dumbstruck by the rear of the van, holding their instrument cases limply by their sides.

The quartet stare up at the place in the sky where the rocket disappeared. The trail of smoke is almost invisible against the dark sky, but it hasn't all blown away yet, and Hal can pick it out from where it blots out stars he knows should be there. They all stand there for a little while, shifting their weight from leg to leg and shuffling awkwardly in the dust. Then they wordlessly climb into the van and follow the highway back to civilization.

***

Spades Slick doesn't think much about himself. No fuckin' time for that when there are jobs that need doin' and motherfuckers that need to be doin' jobs.

Right now, he finds himself smack in the middle of one of the most twisted and bizarre jobs he's ever heard of.

In the middle of the New Mexico desert there is a large building built out of white corrugated tin. The outside is featureless save for two air conditioning units and a single unmarked door. Spades Slick found himself outside this suspicious-ass building following orders he received on a phone call three days prior. An old associate, Snowman, calls him up askin' for special assistance on a job. Says they need his particular skills. So he drags his sorry ass outta Las Vegas and down here on promise of a comped four-star-hotel and who knows what else. This probably was not the right decision.

Inside the white metal building, Spades Slick is now aware, is a fully furnished house decked in green velvet and lacquered wood. Slate facades on the tin walls and everything. Bowls of complementary candy and copies of _Terrier Fancy_ languishing in the overcontrolled climate. It is cold as fuck in here. The Doc doesn't seem to mind it.

The Doc is six foot nothing exactly and completely hairless. Not even eyelashes. His face is so goddamn pale and shiny that it's hard to even get a good look at it. At present, the Doc is accompanied by Snowman, who is six foot one and has jet black hair done up in a vintage bob. Spades Slick knows better than to look at her too closely.

The Doc sits square in the middle of a bright green chaise, still as a fuckin' statue. Snowman stands behind him, one hand on the back of the chaise and the other holding her cigarette. She always smokes indoors and it never makes her clothes stink. What a mystery.

Spades Slick sits awkwardly on a couch long enough to hold at least four people with room left over for a lapdog. He crosses his arms and puts one leg up on a chartreuse ottoman, trying to look nonchalant and almost succeeding. "So you want me to blow up some radio equipment?" He hooks one dark eyebrow and sneers. "Doc, I appreciate your thinking of me here, but this doesn't seem like a job that requires any a' my _particular skills._ "

The Doc's expression shifts from one unreadable configuration to another. "Slick, I need you to do this job because I _trust you._ "

Slick swallows uncomfortably. He's hung around these lousy people for long enough that he knows that "I trust you" is just their way of sayin' "I got blackmail on you, so you better go along if you know what's good for you." Just another one of their sadistic traits, alongside worshipping the inferior game of billiards.

"And," the Doc continues. "I need you to do it because I know you're not going to get squeamish."

"What are you sayin', exactly?" Slick drawls. "What part of this cut-n'-dry destruction of property involves anything that would make anyone squeamish?"

The Doc leans in, setting his elbows on his knees, hands clasped together below his chin. "I'm telling you this because you're my friend, Slick," he says. "Respect that."

Yeah, sure. "You're my friend" is an easy translation of "you can't do shit to stop this unless you wanna get yourself killed, so listen up, kid."

Slick frowns. "Alright," he says. "Lay it on me."

The Doc smiles. "This is my endgame, Slick. This is the biggest job you're ever going to do-- and don't take that as a threat, mind, I'm not saying it has to be the _last_ job-- and it requires a level of discretion and loyalty that I can trust you and you alone to provide," the man's brow lowers, casting his eyes in shadow. "This is an operation on a global scale. I'm asking you to put a couple antennae out of commission, yes, but that is only the first step. I'm asking you to be complicit in taking sixteen hostages, maybe more, and using them to tear society to _shreds._ "

Jesus fucking Christ. This is the most outright evil the Doc has ever shown, and he's only doing it because he knows Slick can't back out. This is just a formality. Hell, it's a form of psychological torture. Slick stares and nods silently. "Fine. I'll do whatever you say, Doc," he says. "But I ain't killin' any more kids on your behalf."

The Doc's smile widens. It's the first time Slick has ever seen his teeth, and they're almost the same color as his skin. "This time, you won't have to kill anybody at all," he says. "And if we're lucky, nobody even has to die." The Doc sits back up and straightens his back, his invisible eyes bearing down bearing down on Slick. "Tell me, Slick," he continues. "How lucky do you think we are?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and also in which the author has never even been to new mexico


	5. Chapter IV: Forward Scattering

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Gamzee is there and Dave has an emo moment at a party.

So Megido comes to movie night. A couple others do, too: Vantas, even though they don't watch one of his movies, and Gamzee, even though he falls asleep five minutes in. Gamzee is the main thing weighing on Dave's mind right now.

It's six days into the mission when Dave is finally cornered into a conversation with the man. Dave is coming back to the main room for downtime after his scheduled two hours in the gym when he literally crashes into him.

"Sorry," Dave mumbles, trying not to make eye contact.

"No problem, brother," Gamzee responds, craning his head down to forcibly look into Dave's eyes. "You got some pretty motherfuckin' peepers."

"Yeah, thanks," Dave replies reluctantly. "They're kind of a pain in the ass." He doesn't elaborate any further, and thankfully Gamzee isn't the type to ask reasonable follow-up questions.

"Man, you skate?" He asks instead.

"You're the second person here to ask me that," Dave laughs in a way that is also sort of an exasperated sigh. "Yeah, I used to."

"I was askin' cause you look like you belong on the cover of one of them streetwear magazines," Gamzee continues. "Photogenic as all fuck in some kind of artfully motherfuckin' distressed leather jacket. N' the shoes with the big ass bottom part."

_Is this flirting?? Is this douchebag who doesn't know what the sole of a shoe is called literally fucking flirting right now?!_

"Damn, I could say the same about you," Dave responds. _This is not the correct way to make this interaction less flirty, holy shit!_ "You look like you belong just about anywhere that isn't standing right in front of me." He smiles awkwardly and wishes for a window to jump out of, vacuum of space be damned.

Gamzee laughs, an incredibly offputting wheezing sound punctuated with nasally honks and spasming glottal noises. "Amen, brother," he eventually says. "Me n' my motherfuckin' self are often thinkin' the same exact shit."

"How'd you end up here, anyway?" Dave asks, pretending he doesn't want this conversation to end as soon as possible. All routes of escape are futile, though, so he's forced to endure it.

Gamzee cracks a lopsided smile that seems to actually split his face in half. “Got my start flying in the military before I up and realized I ain’t felt right droppin’ bombs n’ shit on motherfuckers I ain’t never even met." An admirable sentiment, Dave guesses. "Hit the grind and got myself qualified to be a motherfuckin’ astronaut. Now I’m up here workin’ on fuckin’ spaceships, man. Spaceships."

"Congratulations," Dave says to fill the pause left when Gamzee's eyes go glassy at the mention of spaceships. This dude has to be high on something, and Dave honestly wouldn't mind getting his hands on it sometime.

"This is my first time up in a while, man, I was takin’ a three year motherfuckin’ siesta from havin’ my mind blown in space all the fuckin’ time," Gamzee continues to exposit. "Then I realized, brother, being all down there on the Earth was really what was blowin’ my mind in a bad motherfucking way.” His smile disappears. “I’m tellin’ you, man, having gravity n’ shit on your brain twenty-four seven,” he pauses to stretch his jaw open like a snake, moving it back and forth with audible clacking. Then he glares at Dave severely, leering down from above. “It makes you FUCKING CRAZY.”

Okay. Okay, normal dude in a normal situation here. It's fine it's literally totally fine and Dave has never been happier to see Captor banging his scraggly arms against the walls _oh thank fuck._ "Yo, Captor," he calls out as loud as possible. "Would you believe that my homie Gamzee here asked me the same exact question you did, _do I skate?_ Motherfuck, I might just drop out of the space program and get my ass to the halfpipe if my skater energy is that strong." Once he's sure Captor is paying attention, he mouths "GET ME OUT OF HERE" as obviously as possible and exposes the whites of his eyes in full panic.

Captor gets the message. "Yeah, great work, Strider," he says. "How about you get your ass to the kitchen and show me how the fuck to make a hamburger, I don't understand your American foodstuffs."

"Oh, sure thing, buddy," Dave says, smiling like a middle schooler on picture day.

"I'll get out of your motherfuckin' way, then," Gamzee says. "Just remember to keep your fuckin' head on straight, brother." He flattens himself against the wall and Dave immediately bounces past him and right into Captor's shoulder.

"Fuck," Dave winces as he stabilizes against the wall. "I'm gonna get a damn concussion from crashing into assholes all the time."

"You deserved that one," Captor huffs. "That's what you get for relying on _me_ to save you from the one-man psycho circus currently on board."

"You're saying I can rely on you?" Dave smiles and holds a hand up to his cheek, feigning a lovestruck blush. "Captor- _kun_ , I--" Captor flicks him between the eyes before Dave can finish his thought. Dave doesn't flinch long enough to miss Captor's smirk, though.

"Strider!" A woman calls from behind. Dave turns around to see Pyrope and Serket floating through the entranceway, Gamzee nowhere to be seen.

"Pyrope, yeah?" Dave asks.

She nods. "So you and Officer Lemonhead are friends?"

Dave looks at Captor and struggles to hold in a laugh. "Obviously," he says. "We're like, blood brothers."

"Me and Terezi are blood sisters," Serket announces, whipping her braid to the other shoulder. She strikes a pose, leering forwards with her hands on her hips. "Maybe we should have a duel or something."

"Ooh, yes," Pyrope says excitedly, clapping her hands together below her chin.

"I'm down," Dave says. "But y'all better be good, 'cause I only stab women if it's a fair fight."

"But you'll stab men," Pyrope grins. "If you're fighting dirty?" She waggles her eyebrows dramatically.

"It's an open secret," Dave responds, grinning back at her.

"Get a room," Serket rolls her eyes. "To stab each other or _whatever else_ in."

"I'd just like to interject here," Captor says, opening the microwave door to retrieve a freshly warmed meat puck wrapped in metallic casing. "That you were supposed to help me with this fucking hamburger." He glares at Dave.

"Oh, shit, you were serious?" Dave remarks. "No problem, homeslice. Where do y'all keep bread products?"

"Aaaanyway," Serket enunciates. "I actually came here to invite you to me and Terezi's party."

"You're having a party?" Dave says, back turned as he gropes around the cabinet for a hamburger bun. "Lemonhead, you don't have celiac or anything, right?"

"Don't call me that," Captor states. "And no, I don't."

"Yes, we're having a party," Serket continues. "Tonight! With music and candy and Mario Kart and everything!"

"Sollux can come too," Pyrope adds, but Serket looks at her disapprovingly.

"Fine, you can both come, as long as you don't start making out in the corner or whatever," Serket says.

"I have a girlfriend," Captor mutters.

"What?" Serket shrieks indignantly like a scorned high schooler. "Who?! I didn't know this!"

"You've met her," Captor says.

"Is she _on this ship?!?!_ " Serket says, almost fully screaming, and Pyrope has to pat her shoulder to calm her down.

Captor doesn't respond.

Serket takes a deep breath to steady herself. "Hey, good on you, hackerboy," she says, more calmly. "I'm just disappointed I can't mock you for being a virgin anymore. Or I could, but it wouldn't be accurate, would it?"

Captor stays silent, taking a bite of his newly-assembled burger instead of answering.

"Come onnnn, Captor," Serket presses, leaning in closer to him. Captor looks like he might bite her hand off. "Spill it! Have you, or have you _not--_ "

He doesn't bite her. He just clocks her in the face instead.

Everyone in the room stares, stunned. Serket holds one hand up to her jaw, massaging it. "Well, fuck me!" She exclaims. "Nice one, Captor. I didn't think you were capable of hurting anyone besides yourself!"

Captor pulls back for another punch, but this time Dave is present to intervene. "Do _not,_ " he commands sternly, grabbing the other man's wrist. Captor doesn't have a lot of muscle, and Dave can feel the tendons sliding around under the skin as he forces the hand to Captor's side. It's kind of an uncomfortable sensation.

"Commander's gonna kick your ass," Pyrope gasps. "But I still expect to see you at the party! The Prospit gym! Tonight at eight!" She smiles again and drags Serket out of the room.

"Shit, dude," Dave remarks once the two women have left. "You even still wanna go?"

"Mhm, yeah," Captor says, grabbing the hamburger out of the air and wolfing it down in two bites. "TZ's a pal, Serket is just the festering tumor that sticks to her."

Dave chuckles. "Nice. Imma head to lab now, I got science to do," he says. "See you later, alligator."

"In a while, crocodile," Captor mumbles without looking in Dave's direction at all.

***

The party is actually pretty dope. Everybody's favorite blood sisters are there, so are Jade and Vantas. Gamzee's absence is a blessing. Megido floats in and out, popping in whenever she needs a break from cross-referencing schedules. The soundtrack is a mutual effort, but everyone seems to have agreed to keep it mellow and contribute from their individual Spotify playlists. The stash of candy and chips is also collectively sourced. Dave even breaks out his personal supply of apple juice, and there's enough for each attendee to have two boxes.

Captor ends up kicking everyone's ass _hard_ at Mario Kart 64 by pulling off all these insane skips and wall-bounces that leave even Jade in the dust. When he takes a round off, Jade and Dave are the top contenders; Vantas and Serket are overly aggressive and get fucked on sharp turns and ledges; Pyrope's good but relies a little too heavily on getting the right items. Megido only plays one round and comes dead last because she didn't know which character was hers. Everyone has a good-natured laugh about it.

People toss around conversation partners like square dancing. The pairs of old friends eventually run out of things to talk about and move on to introducing themselves to a newer crewmate. This is how Dave gets properly acquainted with Vantas, the two of them being wallflowers while the ladies try to invent new microgravity dance moves in the center (Captor is unfortunately absent for this.)

"You come here often?" Dave starts off in typical fashion.

"Yeah, too fucking much," Vantas says gruffly, staring towards the opposite wall.

"Damn, are you not having a good time?" Dave asks sympathetically.

Vantas groans. "It's not even about the party. This is just-- this is just another one of Serket's fucking mind games in action."

"How so?" Dave prompts. He sucks the last of his apple juice out of the box and carefully compresses it into the trash receptacle.

"She's always pitting people against each other," the Russian grumbles. "She's using this opportunity to squeeze blackmail out of them so she can manipulate her alliances later." He turns to face Dave. "And don't ask me what she's allying against! I have no fucking clue!" He sighs and looks away again. "At least she already knows everything about me. You're the one she has to worry about." Dave can see him smiling in profile. The main lights of the room are dimmed, and the darkness is only cut by someone's battery-powered strobe light which projects twinkling purple circles around the space.

"Guess so," Dave says. "She already knows I'm gay, at least."

Vantas snorts. "You got any more interesting secrets?" He asks, looking at Dave from the corner of his eye.

"Vantas, I hardly know you!" Dave pretends to be insulted. "Fine, I'll admit it. I erased my brother's Pokémon Yellow save in second grade. But he always used cheats anyway."

"That's a major transgression, Strider," Vantas says. "I don't know if I can look at you the same way anymore."

"And how were you looking at me, exactly?" Dave smirks. Vantas shoves him in the shoulder, sending him floating a few inches away. They end up breaking into laughter simultaneously.

"Same way I look at my favorite cell cultures," Vantas finally answers. "With fascination and disgust."

"I'll take it," Dave says, moving back to his previous spot on the wall. "Wish I could say I looked at you like I look at my favorite sound-dampening pseudometals. Unfortunately, nothing else on Earth could ever be that sexy."

"We're not even on Earth, dumbass," Vantas snarks. "But I appreciate the sentiment."

The two of them watch the dancers in silence for a while. Captor re-enters the scene and Jade convinces him to spin around with her. She looks like she might end up yanking his arms out of their sockets at any moment, but both of them have smiles on their faces.

It's weird how normal the whole thing is. It's nostalgic, even, the way everyone laughs and plays and teases one another like college kids at a typical weekend party. It's also totally innocent: no one is drunk or high or having a mental breakdown, and Dave struggles to remember the last party he went to where that could be reasonably expected. Work parties aren't even really parties, and all the weddings and birthdays and graduations he's been to in the past two decades have been founded on at least a moderate consumption of alcohol. He eventually settles on a distant memory of high school, a rare moment of exposure in that purposefully blacked-out era. John and Jade and Dave dancing in John's suburban backyard to douchey EDM playing from a scratched-up iPhone, all of them exhausted but glowing with happiness as they collapse into the grass and laugh until their lungs ache. It's a random weeknight, no special occasion, only planned about fifteen minutes in advance with a " _can i hang out at your place_ " text.

"Strider?" Vantas says. "Are you okay?"

"Shit, yeah," Dave says, brushing his bangs off his forehead. "Just got lost thinkin' about the halcyon days of old."

"Uh-huh," Vantas nods slowly. "Whatever you say."

"I promise, man," Dave lets out a long exhale. "You should have seen me in shades." Vantas chuckles. "I was so much cooler in shades."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and in which vriska stretches out her words by fours instead of eights because i think doing the eights looks annoying
> 
> MK64 rainbow road 1lap by scaptor22 in 0'13"29 [WORLD RECORD]
> 
> i dont know why the authors note is at the bottom of this chapter also???


	6. Chapter V: One-Way Light Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dave and Nepeta are vloggers and everything goes wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for blood, gore, injury, fire, panic, dissociation, brief implications of ptsd & abuse, vague mentions of nudity

"Look at the camera more. No, the other way!" Nepeta laughs. She's roped Dave into guest-starring in her vlog series and insists he does the intro for this one. Dave adjusts his position slightly and Nepeta shoots him a thumbs up and a wink.

Dave stands motionless for a few seconds, watching the red LED on the camera. Then he falls into a dramatic split, legs at a perfect 180 degree angle. It doesn't even hurt that much because of the weightlessness. "Hello effurrybody," he says flatly, staring directly at the camera.

"Cut! That was purrfect!" Nepeta cheers. "Okay, now come sit next to me over here and let me do the introduction."

They move to the other side of the room. Nepeta sits cross-legged in the air, laptop balanced in front of her, while Dave adjusts the camera. It's on a custom-built tripod (Nepeta says Zahhak made it for her) that attaches to the floor or walls with magnets, to keep the camera from floating away in microgravity. Dave makes sure everything is in focus before jumping to sit next to Nepeta.

"Welcome to the vlog!" Nepeta says excitedly, posing with her hands curled in front of her face. "Today, we have a special guest. Dave is here!"

Dave looks at the camera. "Dave is here," he echoes, smiling. This reminds him of the first few years of high school, when he would try to make vlogs in his bedroom with an iPhone 3 as the camera. His YouTube channel is long gone, but he keeps a master copy of every video on an unlabeled CD in the back of his closet. You never know when they might end up being post-ironically cool.

"And we are doing Q and A!" Nepeta continues. "I have all the questions you guys sent in last week, and we're gonna answer some of them!" She clicks around on the laptop. "Okay, 'owo whos this' asks: what is one thing you wish you could bring with you to space but can't?"

"Whipped cream," Dave answers first. "You're not allowed to bring aerosol cans in case they explode and kill everyone."

"Ooh, yeah," Nepeta says. "We have pumpkin pie up here, but no whipped cream."

"Sad," Dave remarks, shaking his head and pretending to wipe a tear off his cheek.

Nepeta giggles. "Um, I would have to say… a cat." She smiles deviously at the camera.

Nepeta passes the laptop to Dave to read the next question. "'kk e' asks: what happens if you get sick in space?" Dave looks at the camera with a serious expression. "You _die_ ," he says. Nepeta struggles to hold in a laugh. "Oh, man, you should let me do editing on this," Dave says to her. "I want to have like, explosions and skulls and shit on screen when I say that."

"Okay!" Nepeta chirps. Dave punches the air in excitement and passes the computer back to Nepeta. "Next question. 'Jenny' asks: who is the guy in the background at 2:52 in the last video?" She reads.

"I don't know, who is it?" Dave leans over to look at the laptop. Nepeta opens up her last video and skips to the moment in question.

"It's Sollux!" She says, looking back at the camera. "He doesn't want to be in a video, I asked him already." She pouts.

"Yeah, he's like a sasquatch or something," Dave adds. "He's allergic to cameras." He envisions editing Captor's face on some blurry picture of bigfoot and smiles. "Okay, this one is for me, specifically," he says, looking back at the laptop. They've stopped passing it back and forth and now just lean over it in the middle. "'Connor5k' asks: Dave, do you have a twin?" He stares back at the camera. "Yes. Why are you asking."

"'Dat person' asks: if you could trade jobs with any of your crewmates, who would you pick?" Nepeta says. "I think this is a fun one, um, I would pick Tavros so I could hang out in the greenhouse."

"I gotta say Karkat's job sounds the most interesting to me," Dave says. "He's working on cancer cells and stuff, so he gets to poke around in these nasty tissue cultures all day."

"Eeewww!" Nepeta says, smiling. "I don't think Karkat would want to do your job, though, he would probably break everything."

"True, true," Dave nods. "Second to last question here. 'Marcos' asks: what is your favorite food to eat in space?"

"Hot sauce," Nepeta answers quickly. "Doesn't matter what it's on. Hot sauce is the best."

"I have to agree," Dave says. "Hot sauce and any kind of meat product."

"Final question!" Nepeta announces. "'GoodVibes' asks: are you really in space?"

"Are you?" Dave says to the camera, raising one eyebrow.

Nepeta laughs. "Okay, that's it for this time! Thanks for watching!" She shuts the laptop and reaches over to turn off the camera. "I'll do the normal cuts and audio stuff, then you can add all your wacky effects," she says to Dave. "You have to keep it PG, though!"

"No problemo, Catnip," Dave says, stretching his legs out of the crossed position. "That's what your name means, isn't it?"

"Yeah!" Nepeta responds happily. "My mom's a botanist, so she knows a lot of herbs and stuff. And she loves cats."

"Runs in the family, yeah?" Dave says, smirking and raising his hand for a fistbump.

"Oh yeah," Nepeta smirks back, bumping her fist against his. " _Psshooooo,_ " she imitates an explosion when she pulls back, wiggling her fingers in the air. She looks up at Dave and turns her smirk into a full-on smile. Dave can't help smiling in return.

He spends the rest of the day as usual, working out on the treadmill and fiddling with carbon tubes in the lab. Jade follows him back to the kitchen in the evening, chattering about the prospects of tomorrow's movie night. "I really want to watch _Paprika_ again," she says. "But Karkat insists we do one of his movies, which suck and everybody knows it except him!"

"I'm on your side," Dave comments. "His movies are trash and we should do _Paprika_ instead."

" _Paprika_ is better than _Inception,_ too," Jade grumbles. She grabs a bag of food stamped with the Indian flag, which makes Dave look at her quizzically. "Vriska said it's fine if I take stuff from her bag!" Jade insists. "I'm asking NASA to send us curry on the next resupply, anyway!"

"I believe you," Dave says, holding both hands up in surrender. "But you're not starving the poor woman, are you? Does she get to take from your meals?"

"Well, actually, Terezi takes from my stuff and Vriska takes from her stuff and I take from Vriska's stuff," Jade hums as she squishes a packet of rice between her fingers.

"Serket actually _wants_ the Russian food?" Dave asks in disbelief. "Why would _anyone_ want the Russian food?"

"Um, because she's a sociopath?" Jade responds, tossing a jumble of food packets into the microwave.

"Fair point," Dave says, rummaging around for his own meal. Spaghetti and meatballs, fuck yeah. "Let me try a bite of your pilfered curry, though."

"Duh," Jade teases, giving Dave an exaggerated eyeroll. "Only fair that my partner in crime gets to share in the spoils."

"I'm told you're not supposed to smoke your own stash," Dave says, taking over the microwave.

He's just about to bite into his pasta when he hears it, the almost imperceptible squeak of metal on metal. He's sure he only hears it at all because he's uniquely hair-trigger to the sound. Cautiously, he peers around the hallway to stare down the rows of doors. The only other person in sight is Nitram, back turned and talking inaudibly to someone further down. Jade comes up behind Dave's shoulder. "What's wrong?" She asks.

Dave doesn't know how to describe it. A tiny white-hot needle of fear piercing straight through his heart, the mammalian sense of panic like a raw nerve. It's not something he's felt in a long time, but he remembers it. Just the subtlest shift in the environment, something horribly incredibly monstrously _wrong_ that hits right below the conscious part of your brain so you can never think of it in rational terms.

He opens his mouth to try and explain this to Jade, but he doesn't get past a single syllable before the metal door of Lab Four buckles and someone starts screaming.

Dave's mind immediately switches to panic mode. It's oddly comfortable, all his higher functions shutting down while he runs through the emergency protocol that has been drilled into him so thoroughly it's as instinctual as breathing. His thought process is simple, vision tunneled to the task at hand. Fire extinguisher mounted on the right side of the entranceway. Pull the pin, let it spiral in the air behind him. Kick the base of the door to force it open in the event that the magnetic sliding or latching mechanism is damaged. Point the fire extinguisher at the base of the fire. Squeeze the lever. Sweep from side to side.

Reality only finds its way back when Dave sees all the blood floating away from Pyrope's face, her safety goggles shattered and warped and useless. He drops the extinguisher-- it was a small fire, it's out now, but it was a chemical explosion or something oh my god _oh my god oh mygod ohmygod_ \-- and grabs Pyrope by her shoulders. He tries not to inhale the cloud of blood. He drags her out of the lab, her body is simultaneously limp and rigid with shock, and he screams "ROSE!" so loud it makes his throat ache instantly. Wasn't Jade here, too? Where did Jade go?

Rose comes shooting down the hallway from the left, kicking off the wall like an Olympic swimmer and swinging around the handrail into the lab. She grabs Serket with one arm, pulling her forward by the collar of her jumpsuit. Serket is at least semi-conscious and howling in pain, blood pooling from her face and arm. Rose manhandles her into the main room, where Captor is frantically dialing frequencies on the comms board. He slams it with his fist and screams, "I can't fucking get anything!"

"Forget it!" Rose yells at him. "Medkit above the food storage, get it for me!" Captor obliges and jumps across the room.

This is the point where Dave realizes he's begun watching the whole scene in third person. He sees his own hand grabbing Pyrope's arm, watches as it begins to float away, the rest of the room gets fuzzy and if someone's talking Dave can't hear it anymore, but...

Then Rose punches him in the chest and reality comes back again in painfully sharp focus. "Help me bandage!" She yells just inches from his face. Dave complies wordlessly.

He tugs down Pyrope's jumpsuit sleeves, tears off her T-shirt, and, grimacing, removes her blood-soaked bra as well. He doesn't have time to feel awkward, though. Someone throws gauze and a roll of bandages at him and he wraps the burnt areas of her chest and arms in awkward criss-crossing lines. Doesn't matter. He can barely see through the blood floating in the air around him. Oh fuck, her eyes.

Dave grabs a washcloth that has been flung in his direction and wipes away as much of the blood floating around Pyrope's head as possible. It hardly takes a second for more to come welling up from her eye sockets. With shaking hands Dave covers her in layers of gauze from eyebrows to cheekbones. There's so much fucking blood. He wraps the bandage around her eyes once, twice, three times before he clips it right above her ear.

Pyrope is stabilized to the best of his abilities. Dave looks up to see Rose and Maryam stripping Nitram down to his boxers, then out of them, revealing burnt flesh that crawls from his knees all the way to his neck. Rose wraps him in a loose cocoon of bandages, examines a leg that she can move in ways that make Dave gag, while Maryam pries his eyelids open and shines a flashlight into his pupils. "Stabilize his legs," she says grimly. Rose reaches into the medkit for splints.

Beyond that, Serket is being treated by Vantas. She's only coherent enough to curse and scream. Vantas packs her eye socket with gauze and Captor has to hold her good arm back to keep her from scratching him. So many eyes, so much about _goddamn eyes._

Dave slowly turns to look behind him. Gamzee is idly wrapping a bandage around a minor wound on his wrist. Everything moves in bullet time: Gamzee tearing the bandage off the roll with his mouth, Gamzee raising his head to meet Dave's eyes, Gamzee smiling and smiling and smiling until his face is almost nothing but teeth. The words enter Dave's brain like telepathy.

_You got some pretty motherfuckin' peepers._

It even takes a little while for Dave to finish blacking out.

***

Rose stares numbly out the observatory window. This place, a dome installed at the head of the ship and almost entirely made of glass, is one she did not get to contemplate the beauty of while she still could, and she regrets it. The shining blue Earth looms below, but now it just looks like another glassy eyeball.

Maryam enters the observatory, bringing Pyrope's unconscious body with her. She's still alive, all three of them are still alive, but nobody can be sure if that will continue to be true. Maryam gingerly lowers Pyrope onto one of the couches bolted to the walls, covers her with a blanket, tries not to cry. Pyrope only twitches her fingers in return. The other patients in the makeshift hospital are equally silent.

"Doctor Maryam," Rose begins.

"Call me Kanaya," the doctor interjects. She looks at Rose dolefully, her curly hair smeared across her forehead with sweat, mouth hanging loose in exhaustion. A contrast to Rose, who cannot unclench her jaw.

"Kanaya," Rose says. "What are we going to do?" She smiles in exasperation, eyebrows tilted upwards, and laughs in quiet hysterics. "What the fuck are we going to do?"

"I don't know," Kanaya says. "Officer Captor still has not been able to contact anyone on the ground."

"It's impossible for that explosion to have damaged _anything_ involved in communications," Rose exhales heavily. "The antenna, the fiber-optics, it doesn't go anywhere _near_ that part of the module!" The nervous laugh creeps back to the surface, mania and panic intertwining her every word. "It's not, there's no way--" and she loses her composure. "It doesn't make fucking sense!"

"Doctor Lalonde," Kanaya says.

Rose looks at her with a shade of desperate humor on her face. "Rose," she corrects.

Kanaya sighs. "Rose, you are a woman of logic," she continues. "So am I. That is why I need you to understand that, when I tell you this, it is because it is the only logical conclusion that remains. You need to trust that I really have considered everything, that there is nothing else." She sighs again, turning her eyes to the hollow blackness below. She presses one knuckle into the bridge of her nose. "Someone is sabotaging us. The explosion could only have been caused by a sudden increase in oxygen levels in the lab, which someone triggered remotely."

Rose blinks. Kanaya does not look up from the glass floor. "Have you told the Commander?" Rose asks.

"Not yet," Kanaya says, finally coming back to meet Rose's gaze. "Because I needed to make sure you believed it too." She smiles a little, awkward and hopeful, her anxious fingers twirling a single loose thread on the hem of her shirt.

"I do," Rose reassures her. "You're right, I understand exactly what you mean." She closes her eyes and exhales through her nose. "We don't want it to be true. It seems like it shouldn't be true."

"But it has to be," Kanaya finishes the thought.

"I wish you would have a little more faith in the Commander, though," Rose musters a smirk. "Megido isn't one to protest the truth just because it doesn't suit her. She's faced enough terrible, unlikely truths to know they're often real."

Kanaya nods. "Indeed," she says. "If being real and being true are the same thing after all."

"Oh?" Rose remarks, raising one eyebrow with intrigue.

"Well," Kanaya stammers. "It's kind of a long philosophical discussion."

"Tell me about it in your bedroom?" Rose says, feeling the slightest hint of blush settling on her tired visage.

"Are you trauma bonding me?" Kanaya asks, flustered.

"Of course not," Rose answers. "I-- I had my eyes on you from the beginning, actually."

Kanaya blushes back, a mahogany color on her dark olive skin. She tries to push some of her sweaty fringe away and only ends up giving herself spikes. She laughs nervously. "Mutual," is all she says, suddenly unable to maintain eye contact.

Rose gently reaches out to touch Kanaya's shoulder. She's very cold. "We'll get through this one way or another," Rose says. "And then I'll take you on a proper date to Six Flags."

The two of them finally burst into real laughter, overcome with emotions, crying and grabbing onto each other's arms and colliding in a hug like an orchestral crescendo. Rose forgets, just for a second, about the bloodied bodies around them, the buckled metal, the smell of chemical-fried air, and all she thinks about is holding this beautiful woman forever and ever and never letting go.

But she can't forget for long. Even if she wishes she could.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> by the way trying to write motion in a weightless setting is REALLY HARD. nobody can walk or run or have thundering footsteps or whatever, i have to rely on describing people as floating or jumping or being pushed/pulled et cetera. sorry if it sounds awkward sometimes lol.


	7. Intermission II: Spin Stabilization

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dirk and Hal have a fight over the phone, and Spades and Snowman have an encounter in the desert.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw for heated family arguments, sexualized awkwardness (not the same conversation)

Dirk Strider is the most stressed-out motherfucker to ever walk the Earth.

He slams open the swinging double doors to the conference room, where Roxy is waiting for him, arms splayed across the polished black glass table. Nobody else is there except potted plants and errant dust mites, thank fucking god.

"What the hell are we gonna do with this?" Dirk collapses into the chair across from Roxy, letting his head fall into his hands, pushing his glasses up to the top of his forehead. Fuck these glasses, actually. He tosses them across the table.

"It's a glitch," Roxy says, the voice of a woman running on ninety minutes of sleep. "There's nothing else we can say, Dirk!"

Dirk jabs the palms of his hands into his tired eyes and groans. "I've gotta call Hal."

"Why?" Roxy asks.

"It's not a glitch. Someone did this on purpose. Someone is _fucking_ with us!" He lets his hands slide up until they rest on the ridge of his brow and he ends up staring at his own wrists. He sighs loudly. "Hal is the only person I know who can help us figure this out without spilling the news all over the goddamn kitchen floor like a baby with a bowl of cheerios. Fuck it, I'm calling him now."

Dirk slides his chair down the length of the table and grabs the landline phone mounted in the center. He punches in Hal's number and waits while it rings once, twice, three times. Dirk skips voicemail and dials the number again.

Hal picks up on the second try. "What?" His voice echoes throughout the conference room. Roxy scoots her chair around to sit closer to the phone.

"Hal, thank fuck," Dirk says, releasing a breath he forgot he was holding. "I need you to get your ass to Houston ASAP. Where are you?"

"I'm in New Mexico with Pet and the band," Hal responds. "Fuck do you need me for? What happened?"

"NASA job," Dirk answers. "Shit, I don't even feel safe sayin' it over the phone line. This is a big deal, Hal, we need you."

There's a pause. "I _said,_ " Hal hisses. " _What for?_ "

Dirk thinks for a second. The lines probably aren't bugged by any nefarious third party, but they might be monitored by other people at NASA. Giving specific details is not a risk he can take. "You need to help us hack our comms shit back into shape," he decides on. "I know you can do it."

Another pause. Dirk hears something rustle and shift around on the other end of the line. "You don't," Hal finally says.

"I don't what?" Dirk asks.

"You don't know I can do it," Hal says. "Fuck, you sound like you don't even know what it is that needs doing!"

"Hal," Dirk tries to calm him down. "Please. You can figure it out. You're the smartest dude I know." Hal doesn't answer. "I'm serious."

Hal laughs meanly. "You're fucking kidding me, Dirk. You're kidding yourself."

"No," Dirk states.

"Yeah, you are," Hal continues. " _You're_ the smartest person you know. You just want me to be your little clone, huh? Newsflash, asshole: I'm not that egomaniacal high schooler walking around with a Linux laptop balls-deep in the quote unquote dark web anymore. I'm fucking over it. I am _not_ as smart as you, and I don't want to be! I literally don't!"

"Hal, please," Dirk tries to interrupt. Roxy gives him a worried look.

"I can't believe you! When was the last time you called me? Like, Christmas, five fucking months ago? You only talk to me because you need my supposed genius brain to tag you out of whatever you've gotten stuck in. You don't even want _me_ , you want the overinflated idea of me that _you_ made up!" Hal yells until he runs out of breath.

"Hang up before this gets worse!" Roxy whispers anxiously at Dirk, who ignores her, remaining stoic as he waits for Hal to start talking again.

And Hal does. "Listen to me, you narcissistic bastard," Hal growls. "I am _not_ smart. I don't know _shit_ about hacking. I already fucking forgot whatever little amount I _did_ know ten years ago. I don't want anything to do with it, I don't want anything to do with hacking or programming or, fucking, ham radio or whatever! I'm happy right now, right where I am, and there is _nothing_ for me in Houston. Lower. Your. Expectations." Someone talks indistinctly in the background and Hal mumbles something at them. "Tell Dave and Rose I said hi," he says. "Fuck you." The loud hang-up tone blares into the conference room and Dirk lets the receiver clatter next to his shades on the conference table.

"Oooookayy, so do we have a plan B?" Roxy says, rubbing her dropping eyelids. She sounds like she needs a drink. At nine in the morning.

Dirk just sighs.

***

"Yeah, I did it," Spades Slick grumbles into the black plastic burner phone. "Ain't felt good about it, but I did it."

He's driving a rented car on a roundabout path through the scenic New Mexican desert. It is four in the morning, and he just placed time bombs on three radio dishes at the instruction of Doc Scratch. They blow in thirty minutes, and he's supposed to be in Colfax County by then.

"Excellent," Scratch says from the other end. "I'll let you know when I need you. Enjoy the rest of your day." He hangs up, and Slick throws the phone onto the passenger seat.

Yeah, right, enjoy the rest of his fuckin' day. He's gonna be shackled to Scratch for the rest of his fuckin' life. He sighs as he turns the steering wheel from arm's length, pressed into the back of his chair. He runs through how he got here. Snowman lets him know, in no uncertain terms, that they are well aware of some very sensitive information regarding himself, a variety of surreptitious research chemicals smuggled out of a lab in Seattle, three distinct horse races, the concept of 'mixed martial arts with dogs,' copyrighted digital media, and minor government officials in Tunisia. Shit, at that point, he's flat out of options. He says yes.

Now the Doc has no reason to keep secrets, seeing as he's got Slick under his thumb until the goddamn sun burns out. Spills a lot of shit, talkin' about how you wouldn't _believe_ the kind of work you can get done with some retired military bastards and a couple million dollars. Says he's been planning this for decades, he's got it all figured out, yadda yadda. Drops more big scientific words than Slick could possibly bring himself to give a fuck about.

The parts he manages to understand are thus: the Doc's got this grand scheme to get the space agency to talk to him, really push it with that whole "we don't negotiate with terrorists" schtick. Then he gets the government to give nuclear missiles to whatever-the-fuck-country, and then whatever-the-fuck-country uses those missiles to intimidate whatever-fuckin-other-country into givin' up some kind of mining rights. Seems like overkill if all you want's some fuckin' rocks in the ground, according to Slick. Whatever. Now the Doc's got control of both a' these goddamn countries and the mining rights to boot. Somehow this all finagles into world domination and a life of unparalleled luxury and power. This is the point in the explanation where Slick gave up and got distracted by a magazine about cars.

So now Slick's in Colfax county, middle of fucking nowhere, driving to some cave or another. Snowman is waiting for him there with a briefcase full of cash and a bag of licorice canines for his trouble. Still doesn't feel right, but he's not gonna try to make a goddamn statement turnin' down the money when he knows he's gotta do the job anyway.

He pulls into a dusty gravel parking lot. Sure enough, Snowman is there in a wide-brimmed hat and the kind of dress that no one in their right mind would wear to hike around a canyon in. Her cigarette is absent; she only smokes indoors. An aluminum case is propped up against her shin and the Scottie dogs are right there next to it.

Slick grumbles as he steps out of the car, immediately staining his all-black suit with orange dust. It floats around in the goddamn air, stickin' to the car windows and shit. Disgusting.

"I trust it went well, Spades," Snowman smiles as she talks. She's wearing black lipstick. It is now four thirty in the morning.

"Well as one expects," Slick slurs, trying not to look at Snowman or the briefcase. Or the Scottie dogs. He settles on a sort of rectangular rock in the middle distance and slightly off to the left, but he can still feel Snowman smiling at him.

"Good," she croons. "Aren't you coming to get your payment?"

"Was thinkin' you could just hand it to me," he mutters.

"You're a big man," Snowman taunts. "Come get it yourself."

Slick hunches over in regret. He shuffles across the parking lot to Snowman, bends over to pick up the briefcase. The edge of his close-cropped hair touches the hem of her dress, his forehead not half an inch from her bare thigh. Snowman shifts her hips around slightly, resting one skinny hand on the curve of her waist. Slick stands up abruptly and turns back to the car without looking at her face.

"You forgot your candy," she calls after him.

"Keep it," he says.


	8. Chapter VI: Inferior Planets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Dave has read Krakauer; Dave, John, Feferi, and Karkat have a meaningful conversation; shit gets real.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: medical gore, injury, blood (you can skip the first like eight paragraphs if you want, pretty much all of the injury-related stuff is in that section), mention/discussion of animal death

Rose and the rest of the medical team care for the bloody bodies in the observatory. Dave comes in sometimes, making sure Rose doesn't neglect her own health for it. Yeah, it's transparently hypocritical of him, considering that he's down to one meal a day himself and also that a day is now about thirty-two hours long. But he still cares about her.

For the first few days he tries not to look at the people in the hospital, but eventually gives in and decides to get it over with. _Exposure therapy,_ he rationalizes. _Better to know what I'm dealing with._

That doesn't make it any less terrible, though.

Pyrope's eyes are still wrapped in white, but the blood has at least stopped seeping through. If Dave looks for more than a moment, he can see her swollen eyeballs rolling in erratic patterns under the bandages, though, and it makes him want to vomit. He tells himself she's dreaming, and maybe her dreams are better than reality right now. He ignores the possibility that they might be incomprehensibly worse.

The chaotic mess of bandages Dave strung around her torso in the aftermath of the accident have long since been replaced with Maryam's careful lattice of ointment-soaked gauze and clean wrappings. Antibiotics, moisturizers, and topical painkillers are pressed directly against her wounded skin, because she can't reliably take anything by mouth. She lost four teeth and can barely sip applesauce from a pouch if she stops screaming. Sometimes Maryam forces a sedative down Pyrope's throat to quiet her for a few hours. Maryam says her hands are going numb from applying the painkiller-dosed bandages twice a day.

Serket is maybe the best of them. She's mostly conscious and even lapses into coherence when her painkillers drop off. She jokes and teases Maryam, insists her arm is fine despite the fact that it hangs off her shoulder like a bag of sticks. Rose whispers that they would amputate if they could be sure it wouldn't kill her outright. Serket's eye socket is also still packed with gauze, and Dave had the misfortune of walking in while Vantas was changing it and seeing bloody remnants of the eyeball clinging to the cloth. Serket just stuck her tongue out at him.

Nitram is sad but alive. That's what he tells Rose every time she comes to check on him. His spine's been injured and his legs are barely strapped together with shambled splints. He's paralyzed below the waist, and Maryam is forced to diaper him in the bulky underwear meant to be worn under an EVA suit. It's fine, they both insist. They've both been worse. Above the line of paralysis, Nitram still suffers from burns and a concussion from where his head slammed against the wall in the blast. He complains that he's bored, but the doctors insist he needs to rest and keep his brain quiet. He wants someone to read to him. He cries.

The team of emergency doctors wander around like ghosts every moment they're not in the hospital. Maryam talks the most, and she only talks about the patients. Dave spends an afternoon with her and shares his habit of counting layers to calm down. They start cataloging injuries instead, methodical and rhythmic. Double orbital fracture. Chemical burns to both eyes. Fractured clavicle. Burns: scalp, face, neck, shoulders, forearms, hands, underarms, one breast, one hip. Three teeth knocked out, one forcibly impacted into the gum. Damage to the esophagus, sinuses, and mouth from gas and smoke inhalation. Probable hearing loss in both ears. Shock.

It keeps them detached enough to function, to compartmentalize every type of damage into its own place on the list and pretend it's an independent entity instead of something that happened to one of their friends. Each injury is a person Dave learns to hate uniquely.

Peixes appoints herself as the hospital’s night shift, says she can’t sleep anyway. She looks the part. She appears sick and gaunt, and she still eats her designated 2,100 calories a day but doesn’t seem to be absorbing any of the nutrients. Dave is weirdly reminded of that Christopher guy who ran away to live in the Alaskan wilderness and starved to death, some kind of poisoning that meant no matter how much he ate he starved anyway. Is that their fate? To repeat the same mistakes fifty years later and starve to death, not in a broken down bus but a glimmering futuristic space station? Maybe that’s it, that’s human nature: to die, scared and stupid and alone in the middle of nowhere. Dress it up in dreams of a pristine wilderness or technological glory, it ends the same way.

Megido authorizes everyone to use the intercom in case of an emergency. Dave hopes his crewmates wouldn’t have been held back by stupid ideas of duty in the first place.

All communications are down. Nepeta tells Dave she's upset because she didn't get to upload their vlog. "I know it's not that important," she says time and time again. "But if I focus really hard on being upset about this one thing, maybe I won't have the energy to get upset about everything else." Dave mostly sits next to her in silence as they try to distract themselves from the situation. Sometimes he sits silently next to someone else, sometimes he sits alone.

It sucks. It sucks hard.

It's at least a couple hours past midnight when Dave stumbles into the kitchen to eat something. The door to the observatory is permanently open, now. Zahhak tore it off the rails at Maryam's request. Dave sees Peixes staring wistfully out the glass walls, as still as a statue.

"Want something to eat?" Dave calls out to her. Peixes jolts, surprised, and shakes her head no. Dave shrugs in response. Everybody talks less now, it seems.

Dave grabs a packaged meal out of Serket's compartment; maybe it's part of the shock, or maybe it's just something space does to his body, but spice is the only thing he can taste anymore. He rations hot sauce from Nepeta, but Serket apparently doesn't mind that everyone steals from her food constantly. She's stuck with hospital standards, anyway, the blandest and softest food everyone could muster from their multinational menus, mixed with vitamins and pills. Regardless of any of these other factors, Indian food tastes fucking great, and Dave needs every molecule of dopamine he can squeeze out at this point.

Occasionally, someone will suggest the idea of rationing food, but nothing ever comes from it. They have plenty. And communications will come back, eventually.

Dave sits down outside the observatory-slash-hospital door to munch on his _pakora_ and _pulihora._ It feels better, more natural, maybe, to sit next to someone else when eating, even in lonely silence. He can't see Peixes himself, but he can feel her staring at him. He turns around and proves himself right. "D'you need to talk about something?" He asks, awkwardly choking down a crispy _pakora._

Peixes sighs. "Maybe," she says, rubbing her forehead with one hand. "It's just… do you ever…" she fumbles around the words. "Have you ever found yourself not caring as much about people as you used to, and then got mad at yourself for it, because it feels like a failure on your part?"

Dave turns around to face her properly, setting his food to float at his side. "You feeling burnt out?" He asks.

"Guess so," Peixes answers, bringing both hands up to her forehead. "I… you know what, I'm going to put my hair down proper. It's pulling at my scalp." She pushes her hands all the way back, running her fingers through her elaborate braids until they come undone and her long, wavy hair floats around her like a charcoal halo. She exhales deeply. "Okay," she mutters. "Better."

"You're beautiful," Dave says after taking another bite of the _pulihora._ "I say in, like, a non creepy way. I mean."

Peixes chuckles. "Thanks," she says. "You're not that bad yourself, mate." She winks.

Dave smiles. "I'm aware," he replies. "Damn if the one constant on this fucked-up space station hasn't been weird and traumatic flirting."

Peixes laughs again, melodic and sweet. "Not every compliment is a flirt, you know," she says.

"Or is it?" Dave quirks an eyebrow, then puts it back down. "Sorry. I'm not being a very earnest conversation partner here. Swear to God I'm ready to listen to whatever you have to say."

"I appreciate that," Peixes says, some of the happy-go-lucky energy draining out of her with one drawn-out exhale. "I guess I just feel terrible when I can't help people, even when, you know, there's not anything for me to do." She glances back at the sleeping hospital patients behind her. "I mean, what am I supposed to do here?" She continues. "Logically, I know I'm doing everything… everything I can be reasonably expected to do, but part of me is still like, _hey, you're an awful person 'cause you're not,_ I dunno, _ripping out your own eyes and giving them to Terezi._ " She winces as the words leave her mouth. "Sorry, sorry, I try not to be like that. Sometimes I compensate for, like, being too empathetic by being all gruesome and weird."

Dave nods. "Oh, man, I get it," he finishes the last of his meal and folds up the trash. "When I was, I dunno, twelve or thirteen years old, some birds outside my house died, like four of 'em right in a row. And I got really sad about it, and like actually kind of mentally fucked up 'cause it was disturbing as shit, but instead of processing it as _man sometimes animals just die and you gotta deal with it_ I went fully to the other end like _dead things are cool, I'm gonna collect dead birds to show how cool and tough I am._ "

"Exactly!" Peixes exclaims. "That's it exactly."

" 'N like, I still have fossils and some preserved specimens," Dave says, wiping curry sauce from the corner of his mouth. "Because they are legit cool, after all. But I'm not picking up dead birds off the corner of the street to prove how stone-cold-cool I am, as a thirteen year old who wears sunglasses indoors."

Peixes smiles, showing just a hint of her teeth behind parted lips. "When I was seven, I had a pet caterpillar and literally every night I was throwing up from the stress, and I couldn't sleep or anything," she says. "And he was fine! He turned into a butterfly and I released him into the garden and it was fine! But, like, the responsibility of caring for another living organism…" she trails off, and Dave knows she's thinking about the wounded crewmates floating behind her. "It was so stressful to me. When I got older-- my mom's a marine biologist and we've always kept fish and stuff, and sometimes she has other critters like octopus or cuttlefish she's studying-- I kind of learned to cope with, you know, 'sometimes animals just die' but it was, it still _is_ something that hurts me. Like, I have a moral imperative to save every creature on the planet and do it perfectly and if even one caterpillar dies I am a _failure._ " Her eyes start to glisten a little, reflecting the fluorescent white light of the kitchen and just a tiny catch of blue from the Earth visible through the observatory. "Sorry, I didn't mean to start crying on you," she laughs and sniffles at the same time.

"Hey, I offered," Dave counters. "Better out than in, right?" He smiles at her, hoping beyond hope that he actually looks reassuring rather than mocking. It's a skill he never quite mastered, but Peixes seems to relax at the gesture anyway.

"Um," someone says quietly from the other side of the room. "Hi, Dave, I wasn't trying to interrupt your feelings jam or anything." It's John, bleary-eyed and looking very much like whatever it is the proverbial cat always drags in.

"No worries, kid," Dave says.

"You're only five months older than me," John scoffs.

"Yeah, yeah," Dave flaps his hand dismissively in John's direction. "Anyway, what brings you to the combination kitchen-living-room-therapist's-office-hospital-observatory-Taco-Bell tonight? Had a nightmare and want to ask if you can sleep in my bed?"

John smiles like a doofus. "I was just getting something to eat," he says.

"Try the _pulihora,_ " Dave suggests.

"I don't know what that is," John responds.

"Good, leave more for me," Dave says. "Also, this is, uh, Fe..? Fifar…? This is Officer Peixes." He nods in her direction. John waves at her politely.

"Feferi," Peixes says kindly.

John grabs a packet of cereal and dehydrated milk, which he combines into a proper snack at the faucet. He floats over to hover next to Dave and Peixes, awkwardly lowering himself into a sitting position. "So…" he says awkwardly, not looking at either of them. "Whatcha talking about?"

"I dunno," Dave shrugs. He rests his hands on his knees. "Grievances. Machinations, even."

Peixes giggles. "Just chatting about stuff that's been on our minds, I guess," she says, making direct eye contact with John, who seems slightly intimidated by her. "What do _you_ want to talk about?"

John makes a noncommittal hum and slurps milk from the cereal packet. "Have any of you guys seen, uh, Gamzee or whatever his name is?"

The tension snaps. The elephant in the room has begun trumpeting its big fuckin' snout in full force. Gamzee is the elephant. It's him.

"No," Peixes mumbles.

"What she said," Dave adds.

Gamzee is a major problem. Since the day after the explosion, he's made himself scarce. Karkat claims to have run into him in the hallway once, but he is conspicuously absent from all group activities and also, apparently, most solitary activities as well. His food parcels remain untouched and he hasn't clocked in at the gym, things Mission Control would get very mad at him for if they had any way to actually know about it.

"Shit, I wasn't supposed to mention that, was I?" John says apologetically. "Sorry, I just… what is his _deal?_ "

"Do you think he had something to do with it?" Peixes whispers loudly to them, as if he might be lurking somewhere within earshot. Which, Dave considers, he might be, but being so tall means there's not very many places he could hide in without breaking his spine.

"What? The accident? No!" John answers, trying to match Peixes' hushed tone and failing. "I just thought he was weird and maybe kind of stoned!"

" _'Kind of?'_ " Dave quips.

"Whatever!!" John whisper-yells. "But, did he, though?"

"I mean, I don't have any _evidence,_ per se," Dave admits. "But, like, he was looking mad sus right after it happened, and he was saying weird shit about my eyes the other day and then we got three severe eye injuries… okay, I know this sounds stupid once I say it out loud," he sighs. "But man's vibes were rancid as fuck."

"It's a little stupid," John mutters.

"I know you can't persecute someone based on vibes," Peixes adds, leaning closer to the middle of the group. "But just so you know, I agree with you. He is really shady."

"What are you people whispering about?!" Another someone shouts. Everybody jumps and John inhales some of his milk. Dave turns to look, it's Karkat, obviously, being noisy as all hell in the middle of the night.

"Oh, Karkat," Dave says calmly. He makes a point of using his first name as often as possible, even when he doesn't for other crewmates, because it makes Karkat hilariously angry even though they are kinda friends now. "Snooping around as usual, I see. Crashing our slumber party. Tsk tsk."

"We were actually, um," John sputters as he tries to clear dairy out of his windpipe. "We were talking about something that maybe, you would know about?" John's voice rises in pitch as Karkat's frown darkens. Quite a linear function, indeed.

"No, I haven't seen him," Karkat grumbles. "That dickweed. I'm kicking his ass as soon as we land."

Peixes beckons for Karkat to come closer, which he reluctantly does with an exaggerated eye roll and tilt of his head. "Do you think he was involved with the accident?" She asks him quietly.

"No," Karkat says flatly. "Don't say that shit."

"Sorry," John interrupts. "But his name _is_ actually Gamzee, right? Because nobody confirmed that for me."

"Yes, his name is Gamzee!" Karkat hisses. "And we all know he's a terrible crewmate, but there is no way he was responsible for blowing up the lab!" He huffs and tries to lower his voice. "Listen, Kanaya was telling me, she says she told Megido too already but-- she was telling me that someone changed the oxygen levels remotely."

"So we're being sabotaged," Dave remarks. "By who, space pirates?"

"I don't know!" Karkat says angrily "The same person who fucked up our comms lines!"

Gears turn in Dave's head as he connects the two events. He promptly feels stupid for not realizing earlier. "Captor knows this?" He asks.

"Yes, Sollux knows this," Karkat is exasperated. "He's confirmed, everything on our end _should_ be working, and we know if it was a ground issue they would have fixed it by now. So…"

"So someone's interfering in the middle ground?" Peixes finishes, concerned. "What does that mean?"

"Sollux says," Karkat explains carefully. "There's a satellite near our orbit that's jamming the signal."

Suddenly, a deafening static crackle blasts through the speakers. John ducks and covers his head as if there's an earthquake or something, and the others tense up with panic.

"What?!" Serket shouts from the hospital, startled awake and confused. Peixes floats to her side and tries to calm her down.

The static stabilizes into progressively more recognizable fragments of noise before finally settling in as a coherent voice. "Congratulations," it says. "On putting the pieces together."

"What the fuck?" Karkat shouts, twisting his head around, looking to see if there's anyone else in the room. There isn't, and only the ceiling-mounted speakers are talking.

"My introduction is your reward," they continue. It's a smug, masculine voice on the other end. "At this point, there is nothing I need to hide."

"Who the fuck are you?!" Karkat screams. Dave notices Rose, Jade, and Maryam leaping through the entranceway into the room. Jade stares at Dave with abject shock and terror, while Rose and Maryam only look at each other.

"My name is Doctor Scratch," says the voice crisply. The line has apparently stabilized and now has perfect sound quality. "You are part of my plan, and have been for quite a while now. It's nothing personal. You are simply the resources I need."

"Can you hear me?" Rose calls out to the ceiling.

"Yes, I can," Scratch chuckles. "I apologize for disrupting you all so late at night, or so early in the morning, rather. I simply wanted to let you know that I have no intent to kill any of you. The incident in the laboratory was my colleague's idea, actually. She insisted. She and I are in a mutual state of being unable to refuse the other, for various reasons."

"Gross," John says, lifting his head out of the defensive posture.

"I am indeed the one who has taken the liberty of disabling your communications with ground control," Scratch says. "A necessity of the plan."

"Fuck your plan!" Karkat howls like an animal. Dave gawks at him as he pounds his fists against the kitchen wall. " _You could have killed them!_ "

"But I didn't," Scratch replies serenely. "Trust me, whatever chaos I inoculate your system with is carefully calibrated. All of it is necessary. I am not a wasteful man. And," Dave can hear him lean in towards his microphone. "I am a famously excellent host."

The speakers cut out and there is only the placid silence of the station left. It lingers for a few moments before someone starts crying.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> karkat is the one that cried


	9. Chapter VII: Airglow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ###[SIGNAL DOWN]###  
> TRANSMISSION UNAVAILABLE  
> CONTACT YOUR SUPERVISOR

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: prescription drug abuse, mentions of self harm and suicide, death, corpse, blood, violence (incl. minor violence against a romantic partner), dissociation, vague references to prior abuse

Rose lets Dave nick sedatives from the medical cabinet. At first, he thinks she just doesn't notice him, but one night she's waiting there when he turns around, staring. "I don't give a fuck anymore," she says, then turns away.

The drugs make Dave comfortable. It's nice. He's not novocaine-numb, it just feels like everything unpleasant stops an inch away from his skin. If this is anything like what Gamzee was taking, he thinks he understands. It might even be worth going crazy for.

Dave doesn't know if Karkat is on drugs, too, or if he's just losing his mind, but they spend a lot of time in the same rooms. The gym and the kitchen, various people's bedrooms, Dave's lab especially. Most of the labs are abandoned now, and those who still try to work usually end up staring blankly at things for hours until they give up or fall asleep. Dave and Karkat sit quietly in the air, sometimes facing each other, sometimes other things and sometimes the wall because it doesn't even matter anymore if Dave goes all _Blair Witch_ in the corner.

Dave would rather pay attention to Karkat, though. Once again, it might just be the drugs, but he's actually kind of pretty. Dave is starstruck by the way his dark eyes crinkle up, the eyelashes sticking out at wild angles. The gaps in his teeth when he smiles. This part is probably the drugs, but even the most miniscule parts of Karkat's body are fascinating: the crescent shape of the underside of his fingernails, the crease where his palm meets his wrist, the hollow behind his earlobe, everything, everything, enough to the point where it's overwhelming. So many places on a human body that you never notice until you're in a drug-induced haze. Legalize it, man.

One time, when Dave is on a double dose, he strips off his uniform and floats in front of Karkat in just his underwear. They stare blankly at one another, as if expecting something that would make sense to magically happen. Nothing happens and Dave puts his pants back on and passes out in the hallway.

Scratch talks to certain people-- Rose, Sollux, Maryam, Megido-- but never to Dave. He doesn't want to hear it anyway. Rose always comes off the headset looking scared and furious in equal measure. Megido always looks sad. She looks sad even when she doesn't talk to Scratch.

Dave is worried about her. He's worried about Sollux, too, and everyone's worried about each other. The first time Dave notices the tracks of long fingernails raking up and down Sollux's arms, alarm bells start ringing in his head and he goes to the bathroom to confiscate the supply of razors. Someone has beat him to it, and he just hopes it wasn't Sollux himself.

It's only a day or two after that, who's counting anymore, when Dave and Sollux and Megido all end up in the same room together, all of them obviously trying not to look in anyone else's eyes or at anyone else's arms. Dave isn't high, for once, because he's not actually trying to get addicted or kill himself or anything.

"You look like shit," Sollux says to him. "You too." He stares down at Megido.

"Sorry," Dave mumbles.

"We need to do something about this," Sollux says. "I am not going to wait to starve or suffocate or overdose on this stupid fucking ship when I know I have some of the most intelligent and competent people _in the world_ on board with me."

"So you want a task force or something?" Dave asks. Megido stares at nothing and Dave wonders if maybe she's been dipping into the pills too.

"Yeah, or something!" Sollux yells in frustration. "Your friend Harley's good with computers and shit, isn't she? Zahhak too, where the fuck are they?" Dave shrugs in response. "You find Harley and tell her to meet up with me to figure this out."

Dave is about to give a lazily affirmative answer when Megido speaks up instead. "Damara's station is nearby," she says absently, almost dreamily.

"What?" Sollux snaps his head around to look at her. "Aradia, what the fuck--"

"There might be something useful in it," Megido continues, talking right over him. "A radio that uses a different signal, maybe, or…" she trails off.

Sollux grabs her shoulders. "What are you talking about? We have no way--"

"I could spacewalk over to it," she cuts him off again, eyes averted even when he grabs the sides of her head to try and force her to look at him. "It's really not that far, I would be fine."

"It's farther than the tether goes!" Sollux says, shaking Megido around like a doll in the hopes of bringing her back to her senses. "You really think I would let you, that _anyone_ on this mission would let you just fucking walk off untethered into the abyss?!"

"I'm not doing anybody any good around here," Megido mumbles.

Sollux slaps her in the face. Dave winces and wonders if he should leave, but something tells him there's nowhere left to escape to.

" _You wouldn't be doing them any better if you were dead, you moron!_ " He screams just inches from her face. Something in Megido's face flickers and she finally looks him in the eye. "Trying to _walk to the other station_ is fucking suicide, Aradia! You know it is! _If you want to kill yourself that badly, just take some fucking pills like everyone else! At least then we'll have a body to send home!_ " Spherical tears float up from his eyes and he pulls Megido into a crushing hug. She wraps her arms around his waist, limply at first, then finding the strength to grab him back, her fingers pulling at the back of his jumpsuit as he buries his own hands in her hair. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean that," he mumbles into her scalp.

"You're right," Megido sighs into his chest. She sounds a lot older than she really is. "You are. I'm so stupid."

Sollux mutters more reassurances to her. Dave really wants to leave now, but first he has an idea.

"Megido," he says cautiously. She turns her head to look at him, one ear pressed against Sollux's heart. _Oh yeah obviously this is Sollux's girlfriend,_ Dave thinks. He's putting the pieces together disgustingly slowly these days. "I'm taking your helmet."

"Huh?" She blinks at him. Tears wash across her eyes, but not enough for surface tension to pull into a bubble.

"Your EVA helmet," Dave repeats himself. "We don't want you to end up sneaking out in the middle of the night or something. I'm not saying you would, but, you know… anyone can make a bad decision like that." He feels a little weird having the 'we' in that sentence be just him and Sollux, so he mentally decides it encapsulates the rest of the crew as well. They would all agree with him, anyway. Megido is better alive than dead. Most people are.

“Good idea,” Sollux confirms. “Go hide it somewhere. Don’t even tell me where you put it, okay?”

Dave nods and bounces from the main room to the flight deck. The deck is mostly huge bulky spacesuits branded with everyone’s name and details, hanging silently on racks. Dave finds Megido’s, close to the entrance. Her helmet gazes at him forlornly, the reflective gold visor pulled down to act as a mirror. Well, it wasn’t pulled down specifically for that purpose, but that’s what it’s doing. Dave is compelled to watch his own distorted image as he reaches up to pull the helmet down.

He half expects a skull to fall out, but it doesn’t.

Dave holds the helmet against his chest and drifts towards the greenhouse. Nepeta sometimes hangs out here, now that Nitram is… incapacitated, but she isn't around today. Only the quivering radish plants are there, basking in the magenta growlights. Dave ducks under the table of sprouts to hide the helmet in an empty cupboard. It barely fits, but he's able to shove it in and latch the door.

When Dave first leaves the room, he thinks something is wrong with his eyes. It's completely dark. He turns around and looks back into the greenhouse, where the pink lights are still glowing happily. The hallway is dark. The greenhouse is fine. The growlights have batteries, they plug into the wall, they're not connected to the main light control system.

So someone has cut their lights now, too.

Dave yanks a growlight out of the outlet, then grabs another in case someone else needs it. How much charge do they typically have, six hours? He'll have to ask Nitram. Dave holds one magenta lamp in each hand and uses his feet to awkwardly tip-toe into the main room. Sollux and Megido are still there, illuminated by a bright white LED flashlight. The edges of Jade and Karkat's faces are visible at the limits of the light cone. Dave can feel that there are probably more people there, but he can't see them.

"Dave?" Jade asks.

"Yeah, it's me," Dave answers, handing her one of the lights. She looks at it carefully before taking it. The magenta light turns her green irises into one of those bizarre non-colors you can only really see when you close your eyes or have a migraine.

Jade turns around with her light, revealing Rose, John, and Maryam all crouched in a line along the edge of the comms board. She hands the light to John in order to illuminate their side of the room.

"Where's everyone else?" Dave wonders aloud, scanning the room with the growlight.

"We don't know," Jade says with the faintest note of panic in her voice. "The intercom is out too, hopefully they'll be able to find their way back here and--"

She's interrupted by a spine-rattling scream from a distant place in the station. Everyone freezes, and Dave loses his grip on the growlight. He fumbles to grab it out of the air with sweaty palms.

The scream continues for several seconds.

"Okay, scramble," Karkat stands up. "Me, Dave, Jade, Rose, and I'm commandeering Sollux's flashlight." He snatches it out of Sollux's loose grip. "Everyone else stay _right the fuck here._ Lock the door." He hustles the three NASA astronauts out into the hallway and pulls the door shut behind him. Someone on the other side locks it.

"It's on the Prospit side," Dave reports. The screaming has faded out, but it still echoes metallically inside his head. "Go. And everyone _keep talking_ or at least make some kind of noise, so we know if we lose you."

Dave leads them down the corridors of the station on the roundabout route to Prospit, all of them humming or clicking their tongues like Geiger counters. Getting into the other module requires crawling through an uncomfortably small doorway, and Dave has to toss his growlight in front of him in order to fit. He's still lit from behind by Karkat with the flashlight, but letting go of the light makes his heart pound anyway. Once through the doorway, he grabs it and holds it close to his chest.

"Karkat?" Sollux's voice punches through the silent darkness. "Intercom's back. Let me know what's up when you get to the next speaker."

The next intercom station isn't far, right outside the Prospit module bathroom. "We're on Prospit," he says, pushing his thumb against the button. "We haven't heard or seen anything yet."

"Okay," Sollux responds. "Keep moving."

The team inches forwards through the darkness, lights trained on the empty hallway ahead of them.

"Wait, stop," Dave whispers just loud enough that they can hear him.

"What?" Rose hisses into his ear.

"Everyone hold your breath for just a few seconds," Dave commands. Everyone does hold their breath, and then Dave can hear it for sure, barely audible over the ambient hum of the station systems. Someone else is breathing, very close, probably just out of reach of their light.

Dave raises the growlight with one shaking hand, leaning forward until he can see it.

"Nepeta!" Jade cries out from behind, pushing past Dave to grab the unconscious body. Jade grabs Nepeta's face desperately, trying to open her eyes. When she does, they just gaze vacantly at the magenta ceiling. "She's alive, she needs to go to the hospital," Jade stammers, pushing Nepeta into Rose's arms. "Dave and Karkat, you stay, we'll take her. Go go go!" Jade grabs the flashlight from Karkat, and the two women each grab one of Nepeta's shoulders and rush her back to the main room.

"They left us with the shitty light," Karkat remarks, half annoyed and half terrified.

"What the fuck happened?" Dave says. He can't hear anyone else but Karkat now, and the remaining growlight only gives them a fuzzy pink sphere of vision. They creep deeper into the blackout, trailing their hands on the walls.

Dave has not seen very many dead bodies in his life so far.

This is one of them.

Zahhak is floating near the ceiling, his back almost pressed against it and his head and arms hanging down limply. A trail of blood gently floats away from his mouth.

Dave almost screams, but the noise is trapped in his throat and he just stares wide-eyed and choking. "Fuck, fuck, fuck," he stammers, fumbling with the light to get a better look at Zahhak's face. It leers down from above, glassy and inert, and Dave feels his stomach twist like a hypnagogic jerk. "He's dead," he says, not willing to turn around and look Karkat in the eye. Never turn your back on a corpse, you know. Never risk it.

"You're sure?" Karkat says, his normally rash voice now obviously trembling.

"I can tell, I'm sure," Dave swallows a heavy gulp of air. "We need to go back to the intercom."

"Are we-- we can't just leave him," Karkat sputters.

"I'll do it. Hold the light," Dave grimaces and shoves the growlight into Karkat's arms. Gingerly, he then reaches up to grab the fabric of Zahhak's shirt and pull the body down from the ceiling. It runs into the floating droplets of blood on the way down, splattering red across Zahhak's face and hair.

Dave cautiously drags the body back to the intercom, trying his best not to actually touch the skin, but the dead arm accidentally brushes against his own sometimes and he screams internally. Karkat keeps his back against Dave's, so at least the lighting is poor and Dave can pretend he isn't staring at a dead human body. He can't close his eyes, though, because closing your eyes on a corpse is almost as bad as turning your back on it.

They make it back to the intercom and Karkat slams the heel of his palm onto the talk button. "Sollux?!" He yells into it, making the speakers throughout the station squeal. "Listen, Zahhak is dead," he lowers his voice but still speaks frantically. "Harley and Lalonde are bringing Nepeta to the hospital now if they aren't there already. No sign of anyone else."

"Got it," Sollux answers immediately. "Do you have Zahhak's body with you?"

"Yes," Karkat says. Dave releases his clammy grip on the body's shirt and wipes his hands on his pants. He resolves to drown this pair in sulfuric acid at the first opportunity.

There's some indistinct mumbling on the other end of the intercom before Sollux's voice returns. "Megido is ordering you to leave it there and get back here immediately," he barks. "Anyone else on this ship who is listening, get yourself to a secure room and barricade it. Stay there until further instructions." The speakers click off and Dave and Karkat leap down the hallways back to the main room.

John is standing behind the door, keeping it open just a crack, and he throws it open when he sees Dave and Karkat approach. They hurtle into the room and John slams the door shut immediately after them, locking it as well as holding it shut with his hand.

"Are Jade and Rose here?" Dave asks him.

"Yeah, they have Nepeta in the hospital," John answers, pointing towards the open door on the other side of the room. Dave ditches his growlight and swings in the direction of the hospital, but Sollux sticks his hand in front of Dave's chest and stops him.

"Do _not_ interrupt them," he growls. Dave nods and lets himself float back in the opposite direction. The white glow of the flashlight in the hospital casts vague shadows across the kitchen floor, Rose and Maryam and Karkat dancing around each other to the sound of anxious whispers.

Someone pounds on the door and Jade yelps in shock. John leans to look through the plexiglass window into the hallway, but he can't see anything in the darkness. "Who is it?" He yells.

"Eridan and Feferi!" Ampora yells back. "Let us in!" John opens the door and shuts it again just millimeters away from the soles of Feferi's sneakers.

"Is everyone here?" Feferi asks frantically, scanning the shadowed faces around her.

"Everyone but Gamzee," Karkat says. "Nepeta is seriously injured. Zahhak is dead."

"Holy fuck," Ampora wheezes, beginning to hyperventilate. Feferi clutches his shoulder to steady him.

"Dave?" Rose calls from the hospital. Dave bounds towards her and she shoves some kind of medical scissors and the flashlight at him. "Take these. Nepeta needs oxygen. There's some in the burnt-out lab. Go, don't get killed," she pushes him away towards the door, which John dutifully opens and shuts again.

His mind gritty with static and scissors clutched in one white-knuckled hand, Dave navigates the short distance to the abandoned lab, where the crumpled door now hangs loosely off the sliding mechanism. He scans around with the beam of the flashlight until he sees it, a tall cylinder with O2 printed on a label, mounted to the wall with nylon straps. He quickly unstraps it and shoves it under his arm. The metallic blue surface of the canister is chemical-scorched but mercifully intact. Dave spins out of the room, through the abyssal hallway into the main room and then the hospital. Dimly, he wonders when it finally stopped being called the observatory.

Rose takes the canister and immediately attaches it to a rigged oxygen mask taken from the emergency panels on the top of the main room's walls. She opens the oxygen valve and the gas hisses out gently into the plastic tube. Rose straps it to Nepeta's face and both Rose and Dave watch the shuddering movement of her lungs, in and out and in and out, until they settle into a more normal rhythm. Rose lets out a long, warbling breath of her own and collapses into Maryam's arms.

Maryam arranges Rose horizontally on the floor of the observatory. "She hasn't slept in thirty hours," she explains, tucking Rose's arms to her sides. "She's just exhausted. It's okay." Maryam looks back at Dave and smiles a little. "Look, down there," she gestures at the glass floor. Dave scrunches his body awkwardly to look down without hitting any of the floating patients. "It's an aurora."

The bright green lights swirl around the North Pole, lingering on the edges of the Earth's atmosphere in neon halos. Dave stares and watches the glimmering aurora until it slips behind the curve of the planet, or he falls asleep. He doesn't remember which happens first.


End file.
